I didn’t realize just how much time I spent in the kitchen this weekend, until I wrote a letter today and realized that’s about all I had to talk about. Saturday night my friends Heidi and Nat continued the Whiskey Christmas tradition (this is the second year we’ve done it in a row, that counts as a tradition right?), and I volunteer to bring dessert. You know what they say, about your friends being the family you choose. My particular friends are the awesomest friends in the whole entire world, and we make the rounds to each other’s houses for what have become known as “family dinners.” Whiskey Christmas was attended by most of the nuclear family this year, plus a few cousins and significant others. The idea is pretty self explanatory - a party, holiday themed, with a lot of whiskey available for imbibing. The boys take their booze pretty seriously, hence the shot glass of water with an eye dropper propped in it, and the abundance of precisely mixed Manhattans and Old Fashioneds milling about the room. I personally suffer from the A.A.B. (Asian Alcohol Badness) and had forgotten to take my A.A.A.B. (Anti-Asian Alcohol Badness aka Pepcid AC) before the party, so I obstained. We rolled another tradition started last year into the same party, and had combo Whiskey Christmas/Re-Gifting Day. Everyone brings whatever weird gift they got for Christmas that year, wraps it poorly, and foists it upon some other poor fool. It’s fun. In keeping with the theme, I resurrected the Chocolate Bacon Whiskey Beer cake from a few weeks back. I found a recipe for the cake itself online, and ran with it from there. The bacon gets a dose of maple syrup brushed onto it while it’s hot from the oven, and then a dusting of cocoa powder over the top.

 It’s worth mentioning, things have not gone exactly smoothly either time I’ve made this cake. The first time, the final assembly took far longer than I anticipated, making us almost an hour late for the party. I also foolishly stepped away from the mixer (only for a minute, I swear!) while the ganache was whipping, and came back to a bowl filled with overwhipped, nearly unspreadable frosting. I had to literally run out the door with it (not an easy feat, in a sleek satin dress and five inch heels), leaving my poor roommate to come home to a nuclear disaster in the kitchen. Needless to say, I was not her favorite person in that moment. I took second place in the dessert contest that night (first prize went to some s’more type concoction, contributed by the chef boyfriend of a co-worker), and wound up dragging a cake carrier with half a very heavy cake in it around downtown. Pretty soon we hit the previously mentioned night clubby pizza joint, and it was kindly spirited away into the back kitchen for safe keeping. It was a brilliant plan, right up until the vodka tonic made me forget it was back there. Oops.

This past weekend’s version was no less troublesome, but for entirely different reasons. I have no idea why, because the batter was the same and the pans were the same, but all three layers overflowed and burned onto the oven floor. In an attempt to keep our super sonic smoke detector from going off, I had to open the front door, the door into the garage, and the garage door itself to clear the air quickly enough. Not such a big deal, except that it was nearly midnight, and darn cold out. My roommate wandered into the kitchen somewhere in the middle of my frantic fanning, and wondered “Why does this cake hate you?” I don’t know, but it continued to show it’s contempt, in the form of the oven mysteriously turning off and dropping all the way down to 195 degrees before I noticed something was amiss. I finally got everything to finish baking, and used my brand new ginormous cooling rack to cool all three layers at once. (This is a very big deal, my previous rack would hold only two layers, and that’s only if parts of both were hanging precariously off the edges) The result of the volcano-like behavior of the batter was jagged, crunchy, uneven edges. My plan was to simply trim the layers before covering them with the whipped ganache, as frosting will hide a multitude of sins. But alas, the cake was not done hating me just yet. A miscommunication caused me to believe the party started two hours later than it actually did, and so I found myself on a frantic run to the grocery store for heavy cream. Naturally, the first store I tried was completely out of stock. I found a pint at another store further from my house, and raced back to make the ganache. There was no time for cooling and trimming and whipping, so I wound up with a the worst of all worlds. An ugly, uneven, jagged stack of chocolate layers, stuffed with sticky bacon, and dripping in un-set ganache. It was a hot mess. Luckily your family has to love you no matter what, so I took it along anyway. I’m glad I did, because it tasted amazing. I sort of forgot to eat any of it at the holiday party. What I’m going to show you next is in order to prepare you for the recipe to come – to deaden the shock, if you will.

2 cups stout (such as Guinness)
2 cups (4 sticks) unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch-process)
4 cups all purpose flour
4 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
4 large eggs
1 1/3 cups sour cream
1 package bacon
Maple syrup & cocoa powder for glazing and dusting

Icing
2 cups whipping cream
1 pound bittersweet (not unsweetened) or semisweet chocolate, chopped
2 ounces Jameson or other whiskey

Preparation
For cake:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter three 8-inch round cake pans with 2-inch-high sides. Line with parchment paper. Butter paper.

Cook bacon in the oven (or whatever method you prefer) until crisp, then brush with maple syrup and dust lightlly with cocoa powder. Let cool, and crumble.

Bring 2 cups stout and 2 cups butter to simmer in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.

Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and 1 1/2 teaspoons salt in large bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined. Divide batter equally among prepared pans. Bake cakes until tester inserted into center of cakes comes out clean, about 35 minutes. Transfer cakes to rack; cool 10 minutes. Turn cakes out onto rack and cool completely.

For icing:

Bring cream to simmer in heavy medium saucepan. Remove from heat. Stir in whiskey and add chopped chocolate and whisk until melted and smooth. Refrigerate until icing is spreadable, stirring frequently, about 2 hours.

Place 1 cake layer on plate. Spread 2/3 cup icing over, top with crumbled bacon. Top with second cake layer. Spread 2/3 cup icing over along with more bacon. Top with third cake layer. Spread remaining icing over top and sides of cake, adding one more layer of bacon to the top.