Devil's cake of death!

No, no, no announcement with this cake: I've still got a few months to go before I hit thirty! Even so, this is a rather special cake for me, as it's my first real order. Some time ago, I received a kind email from Morgane Cuisine, who was looking for a cake to celebrate her boyfriend's 30th birthday. After a few exchanges, we agreed on a devil's cake. I'd like to share the recipe with you, as well as a few tips on how to make layer cakes. So, before getting to the heart of the matter, it's important to know that cakes of this type (like the lemon meringue cake I made for my birthday) aren't particularly difficult. What they do require, however, is good organization, so that you don't end up tearing your hair out during assembly. So I recommend a 2-step process (because we're not in a Mercotte competition here!):

• the day before: make the cake base and ganache and leave to chill overnight in the fridge
• D-Day: 2 good hours for assembly

The base of the devil's cake is made with cocoa, which makes for a much lighter texture than chocolate (fortunately, because we're going to put a hell of a lot of ganache on it!). The ganache, by the way, is truly delicious: a delicate blend of salted butter, dark chocolate and milk chocolate. In fact, I recommend it on a simple piece of bread, or even just with a spoon (don't ask me how I know, I'll flat-out deny it!^^). For the cake, simply mix the ingredients and bake. But be careful! There are two pitfalls to avoid:

• bake the cake in a pan that's too high: it'll be impossible to bake the cake evenly and it'll be far too dry, so you reason with yourself and bake in two batches (yes, I know it's hard, I feel like I'm wasting time too).
• underbake the cake, making it impossible to slice through the thickness

Once you've mastered these 2 points, assembly is pretty straightforward. Simply alternate a cake with a generous layer of ganache. Once the 4 cakes are stacked, all that's left to do is cover them all with ganache. To achieve an aesthetic result, I advise you to do it in several stages:

• a first layer of ganache, left to set for 10-15 minutes, to serve as a base for subsequent layers and even out any gaps between cakes
• then a second layer to even out the cake.
• finally, a final layer to make the peaks (simply stick the spatula to the cake and pull outwards).

In any case, the important thing is not to get excited and to cool the cake well between layers of ganache. To be honest, I thought I'd never be able to shape this devil's cake, but with a little patience it turned out well and I was happy with the result. For the decoration, I rapped some white chocolate, sprinkled it over the top, and just traced a 30 with a brush. I wasn't necessarily too happy with my decoration, but once I'd done it, I was afraid of doing more harm than good. In the end, I think I liked it (but Morgane knows best). Oh yes, I used Lily Bakery 's recipe and nothing to complain about (I only made the ganache twice because I hate to fall short when decorating, but for a 15 cm mould, 1.5 times would be enough).