Brown Butter Cake with Cinnamon Chocolate Frosting

A few nights ago, a friend made plans for a dinner party at his place. I didn't want to show up empty-handed, so I decided to bake a cake. I figured, dessert is completely necessary at the end of a meal, so it's an appropriate thing to take. I've never browned butter before, so I wasn't completely sure if it was turning out the right way, but I saw brown flecks and it had a nutty aroma just like the Internet said.



Then, when the timer said there were 5 minutes left for the cakes to finish baking, I get an e-mail from this friend. Turned out he had to work that night, so he had to cancel dinner plans. The cake now had no purpose! I still wanted to frost it so that I feel like I completed something so I made the frosting and did what is probably my worst frosting job so far. He came over to have a slice after work since a cake should never be left alone in a house full of girls. Last night, we had more guests over so now there is even less cake.



I could definitely taste the cinnamon in the frosting. A bit too strong for me, so I would decrease the amount just a bit. Oh, and I totally forgot about adding the milk, so the frosting you see here is a milk-less frosting, but it still worked. I couldn't taste the brown butter in the cake though. Maybe it's a subtle kind of difference or maybe I screwed up when browning the butter, but it tasted like a normal cake. Not that it wasn't good. Still pretty tasty in my book.



Brown Butter Cake with Cinnamon Chocolate Frosting
From Honey and Jam

- 2 cups sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 cup milk
- 3/4 cup browned butter (recipe below)
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 1/4 tsp baking powder

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Prepare cupcake pans with liners, or prepare 2 cake pans.
2. Beat sugar and eggs together until slightly thickened, about a minute. Add milk, browned butter, and vanilla, stirring just until combined. Add flour and baking powder, beating until well mixed--about a minute. Don't over mix.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 22 minutes for cupcakes, or 30 minutes for cakes, until tops are springy to the touch or a toothpick poked into the center comes out clean. Remove from cupcake pan and allow to cool completely before frosting with Cinnamon Chocolate Frosting (recipe below).

Cinnamon Chocolate Frosting

(I doubled this for my cake, and I also went about it a bit differently because I didn’t want super thick icing). After beating the butter, I added the cocoa, cinnamon and vanilla, and mixed it in. Then I added the cooled chocolate, and then about a cup of powdered sugar.)

- 5 oz good quality semisweet or bittersweet chocolate
- 8 tbsp butter, at room temperature
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- 2 tbsp baking cocoa
- 1 tsp mexican vanilla
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 4 to 8 tbsp milk

1. Melt chocolate in a double boiler and allow to cool to room temperature.
2. Beat in butter until creamy. Add in melted chocolate. Add powdered sugar, baking cocoa, cinnamon and vanilla. Slowly beat in milk 1 tbsp at a time until you reach desired consistency.

Brown Butter

1. Heat pan on medium heat. Cut butter in to pieces and melt in pan. Stir continuously. Butter will foam up.
2. After foam subsides, small brown flecks will start to appear in bottom of pan. Continue stirring, until butter has reached a nice brown color, and nutty aroma.
3. When you want to lick the spoon, you know it's ready. Turn the heat all the way down.



Now we were just being silly. At this point, it was midnight and everyone was tired.