Summertime is the cherry time! We’ll tell you how you can bake a stunningly delicious chocolate cherry pie with the sweet little fruits and which kind of cherry is the right one for you.
Do you look forward to the first cherries every year? The juicy red fruits taste delicious and are also real vitamin bombs. In addition to vitamin C, they also contain valuable B vitamins such as folic acid, which is important for healthy cell growth.
So it’s no wonder that cherries are one of the most popular cake ingredients in summer. If you also feel like a juicy cherry cake, you will love our recipe for chocolate cherry cake!
Chocolate Cherry Cake: Quick Recipe
In many recipes, the whole stoned cherries are folded into the batter. They are cut in half in our recipe and then placed on the dough, cut side down. As a result, they do not sink completely, and they get a delicious aroma.
You Need:
- 120 grams of flour
- 60 g baking cocoa
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- One pinch of salt
- 120 grams of sugar
- 120g softened butter
- One egg
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 180 ml buttermilk
- 130 g chocolate drops
- 200 g fresh cherries
Here’s How It Works:
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Wash, halve and stone the cherries.
Spray a 26-diameter springform pan with release spray or grease with a little neutral vegetable oil.
Mix the flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a bowl. In a second bowl, cream together the sugar and softened butter. Add the egg and vanilla extract and beat for a minute.
Gradually stir in the dry ingredients and buttermilk, one at a time, until a smooth batter forms. Be careful not to beat the batter for too long or too vigorously, or it will become rubbery during baking.
Pour the smooth batter into the mould and sprinkle with the chocolate drops. Finally, spread the cherries cut-side down on the dough. Bake in a preheated oven at 180°C for approx. 40 minutes. Use the skewer to check if the cake is made. Then leave to cool in the switched-off oven for about 5 minutes. Only then take it out.
Tip: Let the cake cool down on a wire rack in the tin for 15 minutes before removing it from the container. The cake will become more stable as it cools.
For The Cherry Cake: Sour Cherries, Sweet Cherries, Or Morello Cherries?
If you are unsure which type of cherry to use for your chocolate cherry cake, here is a little product information:
Sweet Cherries Sweet
Cherries are also called wild cherries. Their name comes from their sweet, aromatic taste. The sweet cherries are harvested in June or July, the so-called cherry weeks depending on the variety. Then the little fruits are dark red, plump, and sugar-sweet. Even if the name suggests otherwise, sweet cherries are very figure-friendly, with 60 calories per 100 g.
Sour Cherries
You can already tell the difference between sweet and sour cherries by their name. Compared to the dark red sweet cherry, the sour cherry contains much more fruit acid, making it acidic and tart in taste.
At 50 calories per 100g, they are even lower in calories than sweet cherries. If you don’t like the sweet chocolate and cherry cake that is sweet, it’s better to use sour cherries. Sour cherries are usually in season a little earlier than sweet cherries, and some varieties are harvested as early as the end of May.
Morello Cherries
When you buy jarred cherries for baking, they are mostly morello cherries. The strange-sounding name hides an impressive variety of sour cherries. So that the cherries lose their tart and sour note, cherries from the glass are often mixed with a lot of sugar. Cherry cake with fresh cherries is therefore healthier. For cherry cakes beyond the summer season, morello cherries are, of course, great!
Tip for picking cherries: Always pluck the fruit from the tree with the stalk because then they will mould less quickly! Even with purchased fresh cherries, you should always leave the stalks on until you use them.
ALSO READ: NATURAL ORGANIC COCOA, IN GRAINS OR POWDER: BENEFITS AND RECIPES