Chocolate Castles as wel

A couple of weeks ago, we had dinner at a sweet friends house. She served all our favorite Southern Dishes, Southern fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy and green beans. The great ending to the evening was this amazing chocolate cake, which she had found in her Ina Garten (the Barefoot Contessa) cook book. So, needing my fix of weekly chocolate, I bought the can of chocolate syrup yesterday and made it first thing this morning. It is such a rich velvety cake with coffee granules in the ganache frosting. It actually will make you forget that the weather is not cooperating with cool temps, just because we are ready to have the fall decorations up. Treat yourself to this wonderful rich cake that is truly very simple to make.
Thanks Marilyn (and Ina) for sharing that heavenly cake with us.

Cake
1/4 lb unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 cup sugar
4 extra large eggs (this is the first cake recipe I have seen that called for extra large eggs instead of large)
1 (16 oz) can of Hershey’s chocolate syrup
1 tables pure vanilla extract
1 cup all purpose flour

Ganache
1/2 cup heavy cream
8 oz good semisweet chocolate chips (not imitation)
1 teas instant coffee granules

Preheat oven to 325. Butter and flour a 8″ cake pan, then line the bottom with parchment paper.
Cream the butter and sugar in the bowl until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time. Mix in the chocolate syrup and vanilla. Add the flour and mix just until combined. Don’t over beat, or the cake will be tough.
Pour the batter into the pan and bake for 40-45 min, or until just set in the middle. Don’t overtake. Let cool thoroughly in the pan.
For the ganache, cook the heavy cream, chocolate chips and instant coffee in the top of a double boiler over simmering water until smooth and warm, stirring occasionally. (I don’t have a double boiler, so just cooked over low heat until chips were completely melted and mixture was smooth. I stirred it almost the whole time)
Place the cake upside down on a wire rack and pour the glaze evenly over the top, making sure to cover the entire cake and sides. Then place cake carefully on a serving plate. it frightens me to have to transfer a cake layer from a wire rack to a plate so I * (once again, I didn’t do that. I just placed it on a cake plate and poured the ganache over the top, allowing it to flow over the sides of the cake.*