A perfectly moist, pure, sweet and rich and chocolatey cake that has the texture of a traditional cake but without flour. It is so good, it is dangerous!
2 cu. cooked quinoa, loosely packed
1/3 cu. milk
4 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
3/4 cu. butter, melted then slightly cooled
1 1/2 cu.sugar
1 cu. unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. fine sea salt
Icing:
2 cu. heavy whipping cream
1 cu. semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease 2 round cake pans (or a 9x13 pan) then line the bottoms of the pans with parchment. (Do not skip the parchment if you want to be able to flip the cake out of the pan.)
Combine the milk, eggs and vanilla in the blender or and pulse a few times to combine. Add the cooked quinoa and the butter and puree until completely smooth. Stop the blender as needed to scrape the sides and make sure everything is well mixed. This will be a thick and creamy consistency once the quinoa is pureed. (You should not see any little beads of quinoa in the pureed mixture.) Whisk together the dry ingredients in a bowl and add the contents from the blender. Stir until well combined.
Divide the batter evenly between the 2 cake pans and bake on a center oven rack for 28-30 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
Remove the cakes from the oven,let cool 10 minutes before inverting them onto a wire cooling rack. Peel off the parchment and let the cakes cool completely before frosting.
Place the chocolate chips in a medium size glass bowl. Heat the cream in a medium saucepan until it gently simmers. Remove from the heat and pour over the chocolate. Let the mixture sit for 5 minutes or so and then whisk to combine until it is smooth and glossy.
Refrigerate and let cool completely. (2-3 hours in the refrigerator or about an hour in the freezer.) When fully chilled use a mixer to whip the chocolate cream into soft peaks.
Place one cake layer upside down on a plate. Scoop half of the frosting onto that layer and gently spread it across almost to the edge. Place the other layer on top of the frosting and top with the remaining frosting. You can frost the sides if you like, I chose to leave mine simple. Chill 2-3 hours before serving to allow the frosting to set.