For a real chocolate fix, nothing does the trick like a big pile of gooey, cakey, chocolatey goodness like this. Make sure you have plenty of cold milk to go with this.
Chocolate Bourbon Pecan Cake
For the cake
1 cup butter, plus a tablespoon or so for the pan
1/2 cup cocoa
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup bourbon
2 cups sugar
2 eggs plus 2 yolks
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon vanilla
2-1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
For the topping
2 cups pecans, toasted, cooled & coarsely chopped
1/2 cup butter
1 cup cream
2 tablespoons bourbon
1/2 cup confectioner’s sugar
12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 teaspoon salt
Bake cake
Butter & flour Bundt pan. Melt butter in a heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium-low heat, add cocoa, water, & bourbon, & whisk until smooth. Remove from heat and whisk in, separately, sugar, buttermilk, eggs, yolks, and vanilla. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, & salt. Pour cocoa mixture into flour and whisk until combined. Pour into prepared Bundt pan and bake in 350ยบ oven for 45 minutes. Cook in pan 15 minutes, then invert onto cake plate.
Make topping
About 15 minutes before cake is done, melt butter in heavy-bottomed saucepan over low heat, stir in cream, bourbon & confectioners sugar until smooth. Add chocolate chips & salt and whisk until melted & well combined. Remove from heat and stir in pecans. Cool for 10 minutes, then spoon over cake. Topping will drip well around outside of cake and into well, and you may want to spoon up topping/pecans and reposition them atop cake as cake and topping cool. (When completely cool, topping will be solid. Make sure you serve a bit of the hardened chocolate from the well with each piece.)