It’s 3am and I’ve just returned home. I’m hungry. Not just hungry, I’ve worked up the kind of appetite that only results from a night out. I know, I know – how juvenile. Zip it.
The apartment is dark, illuminated only by the refrigerator light. I hear tiny little paw steps – Toby is checking in on me and throws me a reproachful glance as I peer into the depths of the fridge looking for….what is it that I want?
I want cake. More specifically, I want chocolate, pecan, sour cream bundt cake It’s Marmo’s recipe made with 2 sticks of butter, almost 3 cups of sugar and chunky strata in the middle and along the bottom of bittersweet chocolate chips and chopped pecans.
This is an anytime cake. And by anytime, I mean anytime of day and anytime of year. However, I’ve eaten it most often in the summertime (I’m fantasizing about warmer weather), down at the Jersey Shore, wandering home at the end of an evening out.
The cake will be sitting on the counter top, loosely tucked in for the night with a piece of tin foil, just allowing me to glimpse a few stray chips and nuts that have freed themselves from the mother cake and are resting helplessly on the platter… waiting…
Occasionally I can be civilized, cut myself a generous slice, locate a fork and sit down at the table to discuss the evening’s adventures with a group of friends, neighbors, or who’s ever rolled in off the street attracted by the smell of baking butter and chocolate. Sometimes, I’ve just grabbed chunks off of it with my bare hands, all dignified-like.
It’s insanely satisfying: dense (like the hamburger of cakes) with a nice crunch supplied by the pecans and a shot of richness from the chocolate. It’s the perfect cake for, well…for drunk eating. There I said it.
It being January, many of us are coming off a long holiday season of liquid indulgences. And those kinds of indulgences frequently lead to me searching in vain for this cake.
A warning: don’t make it too often unless you have either an NFL team or a pack of famished raccoons to feed because you’ll eat the whole thing by yourself, with or without impaired judgment.
This cake also freezes well so you can make some for now and save some for 3am…I mean, later.
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Chocolate Pecan Sour Cream Bundt Cake
Ingredients
3 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3 cups sugar
1 cup sour cream (the full-fat stuff)
2 cups chopped pecans
Bittersweet chocolate chips (you can use semi-sweet, milk, or white chocolate if you prefer)
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
6 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
Either a large (3 quart) bundt cake pan or a set of mini ones.
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease (with butter) and flour a 3 quart bundt pan.
In a bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda.
In another bowl with an electric mixer (or you can use a food processor), beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the sour cream and vanilla and mix well. With the mixer on low speed, gradually add in the flour mixture until just combined.
Pour about half of the batter into the prepared bundt pan and sprinkle with half of the chocolate chips and half of the pecans. Pour the remaining amount of batter on top of this and sprinkle with the remaining chips and nuts.
Bake in the middle of the oven for 1 hour 20 minutes (smaller bundt pans will require less time), until a tester (like a toothpick) inserted into the cake comes out clean. Cool in the pan for an hour, and then invert onto a platter. Dust with confectioner’s sugar if you like (optional).
Notes
I actually cut the sugar down to 2 1/2 cups and it worked for me
I used mini-bundt cake pans that have a fun pattern etched into them. Makes these little guys look quite dignified (one of us should). Small cakes can also be given away as gifts so you don’t eat them all on your own.
