Flourless Peanut Butter Cake with Mocha Ganache

As the end of the school year approaches (ONLY ONE MORE DAY, AHHH!), I like to whip up a few treats for either my classes or my teachers to celebrate and thank them for a great year.

One of my teachers is a really tough, serious Marine who I have both loved and hated through the year. She is so completely dedicated to teaching, which makes being is her class something special, but it can also get really intense. It’s really evident how much she loves what she does, which is something I admire.

To accomodate her low-carb diet, I decided to make Senora a flourless cake. The flavors- peanut butter and coffee- come from her great love of the two, which she has mentioned many times in class before, just in passing. Originally, I make just going to make a flourless peanut butter cake with a peanut butter drizzle, but the recipe i found made a two layer cake, so it was the perfect oppurtunity to introduce another flavor. A mocha ganache seemed like the best choice.

Sadly, I only have one subpar picture of the finished product, because I gave it to my teacher right away.

This is actually two layers of cake, baked in two pans and stacked with ganache in between and on top. I finished it off with a drizzle of melted peanut butter.

I’m now well-known in the foreign language department for my cakes. I guess that’s cool.

Flourless Peanut Butter Cake from The Knead for Speed
Ingredients

• 4 eggs, separated
• 1 cup peanut butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup milk (almond, soy, or dairy)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease and line 2 cake pans with parchment paper.
2. Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk all other ingredients until thoroughly combined.
4. Gently fold 1/4 of the egg whites into the peanut butter batter, then fold in the rest of the egg whites.
5. Divide the batter between the two cake pans and smooth the tops. There are about 1 1/2 cups of batter per pan.
6. Bake 24 minutes. The sides of the cake will be slightly pulling away from the pan.

Mocha Ganache

• 1 cup chocolate chips
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 tbs espresso powder

1. Microwave all three ingredients at 30 second intervals until completely melted, stirring each time.
2. Place in the fridge for at least 30 minutes to set the ganache.

To Assemble:

1. Carefully remove the parchment paper from the bottom of one of the cakes and place carefully on a plate. Spread half the ganache on top, filling the slight dip that occurs because of the nature of the flourless cake.
2. Remove the parchment paper from the bottom of the other cake and place it on top of the layer of ganache. Spread the rest of the ganache on top in a similar way.
3. Microwave 1 tbs peanut butter in a glass measuring cup or bowl until completely melted. If using a glass measuring cup with a spout, drizzle the peanut butter all over the cake using this. If not, quickly pour the melted peanut butter into a Ziploc bag or pastry bag and snip the tip to drizzle.
4. Store in the refrigerator to set. Bring to room temperature before serving.

Conclusions:

The flavors were not as strong as I wanted them to be when I was first assembling the cake, but set in by the next day when I delivered it. The texture was fudgy, like your typical flourless cake, and was offset by the creamy ganache. I really liked the ganache. I feel like it completed the cake and complemented the peanut butter super well. I certainly hope my Spanish teacher thought so, too!

In other news, I’m taking the ACT tomorrow and just took a two hour nap. Good golly gosh.

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