Chocolate beet cake with kale chips and almonds, or the otherwise known as the "Eat Your Salad and Have Cake, Too" Cake.

Every now and then, I come across a post sitting in my Drafts folder that I never got around to publishing. There are a few usual reasons for this languishing of posts: either I'm dissatisfied with the photos, or I want to save the recipe for the right moment (which never seems to appear), or I'm being too lazy to finish the post. This recipe has sat in my Draft Posts folder for a few months now, and yes, I was never 100% happy with the photos, and yes, I wanted to save the recipe for the right moment, and yes, I was being just darned lazy, but the real reason I haven't shared this one until now is because I haven't gotten the guts to do so. Because after today's post, in which I try to convince you to eat your salad and have your cake, too, with this kale chip and beet root chocolate cake, all y'alls might declare me criminally insane and ostracize me from the food blogosphere for the rest of eternity. But what the heck, right? Life isn't worth blogging without the risks, so here goes....

Kale chips! Okay, yeah, I'm a little late to the game, but finally DfB is jumping on the kale chip bandwagon. A few months ago, I discovered that such thing as baby kale existed, and publicly declared on twitter and facebook (you know, because that makes things, like, official) that it was my new favorite salad green. This comment prompted Irvin Lin (of Eat the Love) to dare me to follow the food bloggery fad and post a recipe for kale chips on this website. To which I answered, "Not unless I can put them into a dessert!"

.... of course, this got me thinking. I actually really appreciate sneaking an unexpected touch of traditional savoury-ness into my desserts (e.g., apricot-thyme brûlée tart? or rosemary peanut butter cookies?), and I always say that having chocolate cookies without salt is a crime and travesty. So why not kale chips? Flavor-wise, they are nice and salty with just a hint of earthy bite, and kale chips are also texturally fascinating, all crunchy and curly, but almost lighter than air. These two properties alone immediately made me think that they'd go perfectly with a soft, extra moist, dense, and rich dark chocolate cake. Naturally!

So here it is. My "Eat your salad and have your cake, too" Cake. Or my "Eat your cake and have your salad, too" Cake. Whatever. The point is: we can have it all, dark green kale AND dark red beets AND dark, dark chocolate. And a handful of toasted almonds for good measure. (You know, protein. Part of a balanced diet.)

But really, joking aside. I'm here to tell you that this cake seriously is dessert-worthy. The beets add a level of rich moisture to the chocolate cake, which is then enveloped in a deep layer of smooth dark chocolate ganache. The kale chips add a much needed crunch to the cake as well as that hit of salt that is so necessary with anything chocolate. And the almonds bring all the oddities together with a bit of familiar nuttiness.

...Or, maybe you might think that I'm now a bit nutty, too.


Read on for recipe....

Strawberry gin and tonic cake

I made these little tea-gin-cakes a few weeks ago and had this post queued up for the longest time to hit "publish"... except for the one small sticking point that I've been at a complete loss of words about what to say in the post.

Sometimes, I wish it were acceptable practice in blogging to just post pretty pictures for your enjoyment. Mostly, I just find myself currently tapped out of worthy words. Everything even remotely eloquent (and plenty that's not) has been going into the thesis-writing process, and I find that almost nothing is left at the end of the day when I have a little time to think about other things, like cake.

Let's see... but what can I tell you about these little cakelettes? I discovered the incredible fragrance of gin only recently. I don't really drink much--most of my liquor cabinet is used for baking purposes--, and so up until a few months ago, I'd only ever written gin off as another clear-colored liquor that, like vodka, must be flavorless. Was I ever wrong! Between its almost-floral fragrance and the woodsy kick of juniper, I'm now quite fascinated by the unique flavor combinations of this liquor. So naturally, I had to put it into cake form, making a play on the classic gin and tonic combination: tonic and lime cakes with gin-soaked strawberries.

For desserts like this, I like to look for the tiniest strawberries available at the market. These are usually the ones that turn out deep red, with very little white on the inside, and their sweetness plays perfectly with the spiciness of the gin. The cakes are a variation on a simple pound cake theme, except with a bit of bitterness from the tonic water and a hit of brightness from the lime zest. The bitterness in the cake is offset by eating it with mounds of boozy, sweetened, juicy strawberries.... the perfect excuse for combining afternoon tea time with gin-and-tonic-o'clock.

Read on for recipe....