Chocolate Kahlua Pie via Matt Lewis and Chocolate Bar | Pie Month

This is the 7th entry in our Month of Pie. Pie Month is a celebration of things we love. Because life is hard, and there should always be more pie. Have a look at the other entries. Really. 

Pie #1 - Lemon Cream Icebox Pie

Pie #2 - Malted Crisp Tart

Pie #3 - Apple Green-Chili Pie with Cheddar Crust and Walnut Streusel

Pie #4 - Peanut Butter Cream Pie with Chocolate Whipped Cream

Pie #5 - Butterscotch Cream Pie with Gingersnap Crust and Cashew Brittle

Pie #6 - Banana Cream Pie with Chocolate Chip Cookie Crust

This pie saved us this week. 

Our lives are not hard, no matter what we say or think. But there comes a time in everyone’s life, maybe, where things aren’t quite sticking together the way they did, like the sides of a pullup diaper that’s been pulled up and down and sideways a few too many times. It’s just not holding its shape quite the same way it did or it should. We are sick (as we always are this time of year), and tired, and snow has canceled school for our son once already, and we’re bound to be stuck inside tomorrow when it snows again, and how can you be getting another cold when you didn’t get over your last one which was your third consecutive cold in a row, and for the love of all that is good and holy, could we just get off whatever messed up, coked up ride we are on and stop for a blasted second? And think. And be. And just stop.

And then there is pie. A perfect pie to be eaten on the couch. Or over the sink. And it has just enough booze in it to kick your mouth into gear, to get your spirit tapping its foot again, to say to your wife, “Oh, now this. THIS is good.” To not share it with the neighbors, because we need this pie all for ourselves. To go back for a second piece because you are eating your emotions, and your emotions are delicious. And you need more. Really.

This pie, this blessed pie, is from our hero, Matt Lewis, he of Baked fame. If you read our blog, you know we stalk adore Matt. If you haven’t purchased Baked and Baked Explorations, your life has no meaning. But if you’re truly a regular reader of The Peche, you know our love for Matt started a long time ago with Chocolate Bar, his chocolate store and cookbook. It’s amazing when someone is creating food that is so perfect to begin, and you watch it grow and deepen and just get better. 

(Have you seen Baked’s brownie mixes at Williams-Sonoma? Beautiful.)

So make this Chocolate Kahlua Pie from Chocolate Bar when life is spinning out of control, when it all seems too much, and when you need to catch a break and no break is in sight. This pie heals everything. And Matt has left extra room in the crust for an obscene amount of Kahlua Whipped Cream, because he knew you needed some extra love.

recipe | Chocolate Kahlua Pie via Matt Lewis and Chocolate Bar


Crust

• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 ½ cups finely ground chocolate wafers (find them in the cookie aisle)

Turn the oven to 325. Pull out a 9-inch pie plate.


Melt the butter and then add in the sugar. Stir. Place the cookie crumbs into a medium bowl. Drizzle the butter over the crumbs until everything is evenly coated. Dump the butter and crumb mixture into the pie plate. Press the crumbs evenly into the bottom and up the sides. Bake around 10-12 minutes until it looks done. They’re dark chocolate, so use your best judgment. Pull it out and let it cool completely while you make the filling.


Chocolate Kahlua Filling

• 3 ½ ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped into very small pieces
• 2 cups milk
• ½ cup heavy cream
• ¾ cup sugar (divided)
• 3 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 3 large egg yolks
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 tablespoons Kahlua
• 2 tablespoons cocoa powder (for garnish)

Take the chopped chocolate and place in a medium mixing bowl. Put a fine-mesh strainer on top of the bowl. You’ll need it later.


Put the milk, cream, and ¼ cup of the sugar in a medium saucepan. Bring it to a boil.


Either sift the cornstarch into a small bowl or whisk it up to break up any clumps. Whisk in ½ cup of the sugar.


Whisk the egg yolks in a medium bowl until they start to lighten in color a bit. Add in the cornstarch mixture and whisk it (it’s going to be thick). Whisk in the vanilla.


Once the milk has boiled, stream ⅓ of it into the egg mixture and whisk like crazy. Whisk in another ⅓ of the milk. Then dump all of the eggy milk back into the pan with the remaining milk. Reduce the heat under the pan to medium and whisk until it starts to boil and thicken.  Once it starts to boil, whisk for three minutes and turn off the heat.


Pour the mixture through the fine-mesh strainer so that it falls over the chocolate. Whisk the mixture carefully until the chocolate melts and everything is evenly mixed together. Add the Kahlua and whisk. 


Let the mixture sit there for 10 minutes. Pour the Kahlua chocolate into the prepared crust. Cover with plastic wrap, placing the plastic directly on top of the chocolate. Chill for at least 4 hours.


Kahlua Whipped Cream

• 2 cups heavy cream
• ¼ confectioners sugar
• 3 teaspoons Kahlua

Whip the cream until soft peaks form. Slowly add the sugar and Kahlua into the cream. Whip until the mixture has doubled in volume with soft peaks. Pour over the Kahlua chocolate. Top with sprinkled cocoa powder.

chocolate fudge cake with peanut butter creme filling

 
 
 
 

Karen asked for cake for her birthday. This has never happened before because she doesn't like cake. I wouldn't say she hates it, just doesn't see the point. 

There's always a lack of understanding, common ground, on particular topics in a relationship. Ours is cake. We love pie. Diggin on the cupcakes. But two roads diverge on the issue of cake. I say yes. She says meh.

Except for one cake, that is. Remember our mention of the Chocolate Bar cookbook with the best brownies in. the. world. a while back? It also contains the best chocolate cake we've ever eaten. Fudge. It's like a cake of fudge. Not cakey at all. Dense, moist, giant-wet-crumb. And a deep chocolate butter frosting for the ages. The best part of it is that it gets better the longer it sits, if you can wait. 

Karen asked for cake because our son was disappointed that she didn't have a cake with candles on her actual birthday. She had pie. And we didn't do candles. Apparently, it is not acceptable to a 3-year-old to experience a birthday without a cake. Or candles. So Karen's eyes got dreamy when she said, "Make me the chocolate fudge cake. But with peanut butter. Somehow. Figure it out."

Slept on her challenge for a night. Then I had it. I'd take the most perfect chocolate cake in the world and shove it full of the filling from the most perfect peanut butter cookie sandwich in the world - the Bouchon nutter butters. This was a holy marriage of chocolate and peanut butter, fudge and an unbearable lightness of being. 

Safest bet I've ever made. Also, the best cake I've ever made. This cake is complete. It is perfected. All other chocolate fudge peanut butter cakes will fall short (sorry). It might not win any beauty contests, but I have no tolerance for pretty little things that aren't worth their calories. This cake is worth it.

Make this for someone you love, especially if you are that someone. You deserve it. Really.

recipe | chocolate fudge cake (via The Chocolate Bar cookbook) with peanut butter creme filling (via Bouchon Bakery)

For the cake

• 2 2/3 c all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 c sugar
• 1 c packed light brown sugar
• 1/2 c unsweetened nonalkalized cocoa powder
• 2 t baking powder
• 1 t baking soda
• 1/2 t salt
• 3 large eggs
• 2/3 c sour cream
• 1 T vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 1/2 c corn oil (I used canola. We survived.)
• 1 1/4 c. ice water

For the fudge frosting

• 6 oz unsweetened chocolate (if you don't like intense dark chocolate like our friend, Alyssa A., you might want to use semi- or bittersweet chocolate)
• 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
• 2 c confectioners' sugar, sifted
• 1 T vanilla extract

For the filling

• 1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
• ½ c creamy peanut butter, preferably Skippy
• 1 2/3 c confectioners' sugar

The cake

Preheat oven to 350 F. In a large bowl, sift the flour, sugars, cocoa, baking powder & soda, and salt. Whisk the ingredients together until well mixed. Smack the bowl on the backside and tell it how pretty it looks. Then feel ashamed.

In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs, sour cream, and vanilla until well blended. Don't say anything to them. 

Pull out the electric mixer and slap on the paddle attachment or beaters. On low speed, mix together the oil and butter. Beat in the water. See how cool it is? You've got solid fats now. That's the secret to the recipe. Turn off the mixer. Get excited.

Add the dry ingredients all at once and mix on low for 1 minute. Scrape down sides. Add the egg mixture and praise them. They're ready to accept it now. Blend it all together, maybe a minute. Scrape the batter into the prepared pans.

Bake for 50-55 minutes. Don't split the difference. Start with 50 and test to see if it comes out clean. Add a minute each time until you're happy.

Cool the cakes in the pans on a wire rack for 15 minutes. Then invert the cakes on the rack and remove the pans. Cool completely.

The fudge frosting

Melt your chocolate, either over a double boiler or 90 second on 70% in the microwave. Let it cool completely.

Clean your mixer bowl and paddle/beaters. Slap it back together and beat the butter on medium-high for 1 minute until it's creamy. Add the sifted confectioners' sugar and beat until well blended and light, 2-3 minutes. Beat in the vanilla. Reduce the speed to low and drizzle in the chocolate. Bump up the speed to medium high and beat for 1 minute until glossy.

The peanut butter creme

Cream together the butter, peanut butter, and confectioners' sugar with the paddle attachment, probably 2 minutes.

Assemble

Slice off the domed tops of the cakes so they are flat. Place a layer on your serving plate. Add on the peanut butter creme. Smooth out without touching the sides (squishing it out the side is tasty but a little ungainly). Place on the second layer. Spread out the fudge frosting on the top and sides using an offset spatula. You're welcome.

Hint - this cake benefits from some refrigeration. It helps the entire enterprise of cake and peanut butter and fudge frosting stand up to the world united while melding the layers together. Maybe an hour. Not a lot. Or forget it and just dig into the cake. Perfect slices are for when you need to appear fancy. Get over it and eat.

deep dark brownies from the Chocolate Bar cookbook

A few weeks ago, Matt Lewis tweeted something that got me excited. It was about a baker named Lesli in Milford, Connecticut, opening her own shop. Matt is one of the guys behind the cookbook Baked and the stores in Red Hook, Brooklyn and Charleston, SC. He also is respsonsible for, at least in part, peanut butter crispy bars, Tuscaloosa Tollhouse Pie, pumpkin whoopie pies and malted brewer's blondies, which we will post soon. He's got significant idol status in our house. 

But what was interesting to me was that he said Lesli, the baker setting up shop, was responsible for Baked's brownie recipe. The Baked cookbook catapulted Matt into sugar infamy, but we knew him from his first project, Chocolate Bar in NYC and its namesake cookbook. The cookbook has the very best chocolate cake recipe ever (yes, will post). And brownies that will make you cry. In a good way. Because we've made them so many times, I knew that a woman named Lesli was credited with the recipe. I took a chance and posted to Baked's Facebook page to see if it was the same Lesli. Jackpot.

These brownies are perfect. Completely perfect. Karen and I went on a brownie quest a few years back. Brownies matter to us like no other food category. They must be moist, deep in flavor, and neverever cakey. Cakey brownies are a horrible sin (Just call it cake. Don't pretend it's a brownie. It's not. It's cake). As soon as we made Lesli's brownies, the quest was over. We found it.

Lesli's Chocolate Bar brownies make you pay attention. You cannot devour them absentmindedly.

Everything else stops, and it's just you and the brownie. 

And then you finish. 

And then you have another. 

And you thank God you live in a world where the brownie has achieved perfection in your lifetime.

It was worth the wait.

Lesli is opening up her Scratch Baking shop in Milford, CT. I have two friends that live there, and one close enough she should just make the drive (Jen Thomson Caplet, I'm talking to you). She's at farmers' markets this summer. You must seek her out and eat whatever she makes. It will be good. She deserves riches. Follow her on Twitter and Facebook. Drive to Connecticut. 

Make her brownies. And thanks, Matt, for sharing her with us.

recipe | deep dark brownies

• 3/4 c all-purpose flour
• 1/4 t salt (we use Kosher)
• 1 T cocoa powder
• 1 stick unsalted butter
• 3/4 t espresso powder
• 5 oz semisweet chocolate
• 3/4 c granulated sugar
• 1/4 c light brown sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 t vanilla extract
• 4 1/2 oz semisweet chocolate chips or chunks (you know how we do the chunks)

Preheat oven to 350 F. Butter an 8-inch square baking pan. Note: If you're using a dark metal pan, the recipe says to turn down the heat by 25 degrees.

Sift flour, salt, and cocoa powder together into a bowl. Give them a pep talk and let them know you'll be back soon.

Get a medium to large saucepan (size matters here, because all the ingredients are going in here eventually). Combine the butter and espresso powder and heat over low heat. Stir constantly until the butter melts. Add the chocolate, stirring until smooth, about 2 minutes.

Turn off the heat and add the sugars, stirring until combined.

Add eggs and vanilla. Stir until the graininess disappears.

Sprinkle the neglected flour mixture into the pan. Stir just until combined. Don't overstir or you'll make them tough. This is a moral failure. Then add the chocolate chunks.

Pour the batter into the baking pan. Smooth it out. Bake for 28-30 minutes. Don't overbake. Just bake it for 29 minutes and call it a day. Place them on a rack and let them cool as long as you can.