Mini Chocolate-Mesquite Heart Cakes with Coffee Buttercream Frosting

---

     Last week my dad would have turned seventy-three.  Today my little brother would be thirty-two.  Next week would be the ninth anniversary of adopting our dog, Otto.  But, my dad died in 2006.  My little brother, Brendan, died in 2013 and Otto died less than a month after him.  Despite its brevity, these special occasions compressed within it can make February kind of a tough month.  I am grateful to be at a point with my grief now that I can talk about them, at least.  I’m at the point now that I can remember them how they were before disease and death marked them.  I find I can remember them how they were, when they could smile and laugh and things were okay because we were together.  Where I am now, I can think back on happy memories without crying, though that doesn’t mean I’m not still overwhelmed with emotion at times, like, say, when I’m taking excruciating care not to obliterate the exceptionally fragile candied flowers as I press them ever so gently into these little heart-shaped cakes with names on them.  Their names—I realize—their names that I hardly get to speak anymore let alone write out for my eyes to see.  I miss them.  So much.

---

---

---

---

     I am grateful, also, to be at the point with my grief that merely making eye contact with someone doesn’t bring on an immediate flood of tears, although, it does still happen at times.  I remember one such moment during culinary school where a particularly particular and notoriously intimidating chef was a few inches from my face, stopping in at my station to see where I was in my prep.  I was really trying not to lock eyes with him, as this fun reflex of tear-filled Precious Moments eyes had already happened a few times while talking to this chef.  Of course, I ended up looking him square in the eyeballs, as one does when they’re being spoken to.  He was onto the fact that something was off with me, he just didn’t know what.  In his way, I think he was trying to impart some wisdom when he said “You know, when I cry, it’s because something serious happened, like, someone died.”  Sure, my eyes would tear up, but I wasn’t really crying—there was no sobbing, sniffling, wailing, or shaking—just a few uncontrollable tears streaming unceremoniously down my cheeks.  Subtle difference to the observer, I suppose.  I remember looking away and nodding my head.  The only other thing I could think of to do was to point at my eyes and say “That’s what this is.”  I probably also proffered something like a “Yes, Chef” for good measure and kept on working.  Sigh.  One thing that makes speaking openly about grief so difficult is the fear of making someone else uncomfortable.  There’s a million things that can be said about death and grief, and there’s also nothing that can be said about it.

---

---

     I recently came across some thoughts I had written down on Christmas in 2010 that I had forgotten about, and was surprised to find them still ring so true:
​
It’s like having the rug pulled out from underneath you, only, the rug is your life as you knew it.  When someone you love dies, everything changes.  In the beginning the worst part is the grief resulting from the direct loss of that person.  You miss them so much and you wonder how things will ever be okay without them.  It’s a throbbing, aching void.  It’s been almost five years since my father died.  I miss him so much.  Him being gone is horrible, and what I’m realizing now, after almost five years, is that his death is still taking place.  When someone dies, all the facets of your life that involved them are changed.  I watched my father die in a hospital bed, and now, I’m watching him die out of every other aspect of my life.  Two things are the same: There’s nothing I can do about it, and it hurts so much.  

Deep sigh.  ‘Twas not a merry Christmas.  

---

---

     Back in the here and now, with memories of celebrations past, I’ve decided not to let their special days slip by without commemorating them in some way.  Though they are dead, I still love them all.  So much.  Love is like matter, I think, in that it can neither be created nor destroyed: only transformed.  

---

---

     I’ve written a little bit about my family’s birthday cake traditions here before, so to that I will add the kind of cake my mom would make for my dad every year: a chocolate cake with coffee frosting.  In fact, it’s the same kind of cake she’d often make for Brendan, and with his birthday being the day before Valentine’s, Mom would bake it in a heart-shaped pan.  What a perfect and beautiful example of just one of the many messages we communicate to others through food: I love you.

---

---

     Making this cake is a tradition I was inspired to revive after reading about foods prepared for deceased loved ones in Sardinia on All Souls’ Day in Carole Counihan’s “Food, Culture, and Gender”: “Food offerings connect the living and the dead, humans and their gods, neighbors and kin, and family members.”  There is a lot packed into that sentence.  Let it sink in.  Read it again, slowly, and let it marinate.  Think of all the ways those connections show up in our lives everyday.  That idea, of being able to connect through food, across the boundaries of mortality, between the worshiper and the worshipped, and despite any perceived us versus them, is so beautiful to me.  Food is life.  Food is death.  In making this cake I say to them: Happy Birthday Dad.  Happy Birthday Brendan.  Happy Adoptiversary Otto.  I love you, always.  I miss you.  I think about you all every day.

---

---

---

---

The Cake:
​     When it comes to chocolate cake, there’s a veritable choose-your-own-adventure route one could take: flourless chocolate cake, molten chocolate cake, rich chocolate cake, moist chocolate cake, chocolate mousse cake, German chocolate cake, triple chocolate cake, and so many more!  I tend to like the look and flavor of a Devil’s food cake but with an accompanying texture that is delightfully, deceptively, ethereal.  A good quality red cocoa powder will impart a hue to the cake that will make you blink once or twice in admiration.  The mesquite flour imparts a sweet, smoky flavor reminiscent of mocha-cinnamon.  I buy it from my local health-food store, but if you can’t find it or it’s just not your thing, that’s okay.  Ryan thinks it’s weird, but I use it anyway (Happy Valentine’s Day, baby!).  I’ve made this cake without it as well, simply using all cake flour and it is still divine.
     Frosting, for me, is often too sweet and too…pasty, as though I could start a side hustle spackling together gingerbread houses for witches in the Black Forest with it.  Instead, I adapted the coffee buttercream frosting from a Tartine recipe, and it produces a beautiful, soft, frosting that glistens as though it’s giving you a subtle wink to say “Job well done.”  This is a special occasion cake that is moist, tender, and yielding.

---

---

---

Mini Chocolate-Mesquite Heart Cakes
Yield: About 24 mini hearts, cupcakes, or 2 8” Round Layers

• ¾ cup brewed dark roast coffee or espresso, still hot
• ½ cup red Dutch-process cocoa
• 3 ounces dark chocolate chips, (if using bars be sure to chop into smaller pieces)
• 1 cup whole milk, room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups cake flour
• ¼ cup mesquite flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• ½ teaspoon kosher salt
• 8 ounces (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pans
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• ½ cup vanilla sugar (or regular granulated, just increase vanilla extract by ½ teaspoon)
• 3 large eggs, room temperature

Pro tip: Take a moment to prepare your pans now so they are ready and waiting for you when you need them.  Coat the pans with butter using a pastry brush, a paper towel, or your fingers for the full experience. It is also always a good idea to place whatever pans you’re using on a sheet tray to avoid spillage, of course, but also for ease of grabbing/rotating/transporting hot items, especially if you’re using multiple baking pans.  

Method:
Preheat the oven to 350°F

1. Pour the hot coffee over the combined cocoa powder and dark chocolate chips in a small bowl and stir with a rubber spatula to combine.  
2. Add the milk and vanilla to the chocolate/coffee mixture and again, stir to combine.  
3. Mix the dry ingredients together using a fork until they appear evenly distributed.  
4. Add the sugars and the butter to the bowl of an electric mixer and beat on low speed using the paddle attachment for about ten seconds or until the sugar is no longer loose enough to fly out at you when you turn the speed up to medium.  
5. Turn the speed up to medium and beat until the butter/sugar mixture is well blended, is increasing in volume, and moving up the sides of the bowl.  
6. Stop the mixer and scrape off the paddle as well as the bottom and sides of the bowl.  
7. Add the eggs, one at a time with the mixer on medium speed.  Allow ten to fifteen seconds or so for each egg to blend in before adding the next one.  Once all eggs have been added, stop and scrape down the mixer.
8. Add the chocolate mixture and stir on low to combine.  If an of your ingredients are cold, the mixture might curdle.  Don’t panic, it’s going to be okay, I promise.
9. Stop the mixer again to scrape everything down as well as up off the bottom of the bowl.  
10. Add the dry ingredients and stir on low just until the flour has all but blended in.  There will likely still be some on the sides of the bowl, but you can use a rubber spatula to fold that in.  You don’t want to overmix cake batters because you aren’t looking for strong gluten development, which would give you a tough cake.  
11. For the umpteenth time, scrape down the paddle, the sides, and be sure to scrape up from the bottom of the bowl, too—I promise you, there’s some unmixed batter down at the bottom there—go ahead and fold that all in.  
12. If making mini hearts or cupcakes, proceed by portioning 2 ounces (¼ cup) of batter into each prepared heart pans or lined/prepared muffin tins.  Tap the pans on the counter to evenly disperse the batter.
13. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until a cake tester comes out with just a few crumbs on it, the tops of the cakes are puffed and and have slightly split.  
14. If making layer cakes: divide the batter between two prepared pans and bake for 40-50 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out with just a few crumbs on it, and the tops of the cakes are puffed and have slightly split.  
15. Allow to cool in pans for five minutes before gently turning over onto a wire rack.  If the cakes don’t release with a little wiggle of the pan, don’t freak out!  Set them back on the rack, cake side down and use this neat trick I learned from my sister: wet a kitchen towel with cold water and wring it out so that it is wet without being drippy, and wrap it over, around the pans.  Now, walk away for ten minutes or so, or wash some dishes.  When you come back, unwrap the towel and unmold the cakes from the pans.  Now say: “Thank you, Annie!”

---

---

Coffee Buttercream Frosting:
Yield: About 2 quarts

• 8 ounces egg whites, or about 6 large egg whites
• 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
• ½ cup light brown sugar
• 2 pinches kosher salt
• ½ cup dark roast coffee or espresso
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 ½ cups (4 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

1. Find a saucepan that the bowl of your electric mixer, or another heat-proof bowl, can rest steadily over without touching the bottom: Essentially, setting up a double-boiler.  
2. Fill the saucepan with a couple inches of water and bring to a simmer on the stove.  
3. Combine the egg whites, sugars, and salt in the bowl of an electric mixer, and whisk briefly.  
4. Place the mixing bowl over the simmering water and whisk the mixture almost constantly for nearly seven minutes, or until the mixture reads 120°F and rising on an instant read thermometer.  The mixture will be thick, light golden brown, and will appear more voluminous.
5. Remove the heat and return the mixing bowl back to the mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, setting it to medium-high speed.  
6. Allow to mix for about eight minutes.  The mixture will cool down as it whips, and will become white, glossy, and thick.  The mixture is done when it holds a stiff peak.
7. Add the butter in eight additions while mixing on medium-high.  Be sure to let each addition of butter mix in before adding the next, you shouldn’t see any yellow streaks from the previous addition.  If you go too fast here, the emulsion could break.
8. Once all the butter has been added, turn the mixer to low and slowly stream in the coffee and vanilla, then return the mixer to a medium speed until the liquids have blended in.

Note:  If you’re not using the frosting right away, you can keep it in the refrigerator or freeze it until you plan to use it.  You’ll want to take it out of the fridge or freezer a couple hours before you plan on using it, depending on how hot it is where you live.  You just want it to come up to room temperature. It will need to be re-whipped in the mixer on high speed before using it. If the mixture curdles, and your heart sinks, don’t worry: keep mixing until it comes back together.  

---

---

---

---

---