We started a tradition of tea parties a while ago, where we meet at somebody's house, bring lots of baked goodness and indulge in deserts and tea, while chatting or watching a movie, mostly an Audrey Hepburn one. My friend Connie was hosting one of those now-traditional tea parties the other day and it was right before out friend Honey's birthday, so I thought I would bake a birthday cake for Honey. The sad part is, I started to feel kind of sick and had to leave early, before we got to the cake and sparkling wine part! So I never got to taste this cake, but the reports have been very positive. It's a bit labor-intensive, so I don't know if I'll be making it again anytime soon, but it sure looked and smelled (and allegedly, tasted) very good.

Cake:

3 tbsp hot melted butter
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
4 eggs
2/3 cup sugar

Orange syrup:

1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice
1 tbsp Grand Marnier

Chocolate mousse:

6 ounces (175 grams) semisweet chocolate, cut into small pieces
1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
3 large egg yolks
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease the pan (9-inch). Whisk together eggs and sugar, heat them up until lukewarm, then beat with a mixer until reaches whipped cream consistency (about 5 min). Sift the flour and the cocoa on top of the egg mixture slowly, stirring in between. Melt the butter and add to the mixture together with vanilla extract. Bake for about 20-25 min.

Mousse: Whip the heavy cream until soft peaks form and put in the refrigerator. Put the egg yolks in a container. in a sauce pan,mix the sugar and the water, bring to a boil and keep stirring over the heat for a while until turns into a sugar syrup, then pour the egg yolks slowly into the syrup while stirring continuously. Beat the mixture with a mixer until it becomes whitish in color and doubles in size. Melt the chocolate and wait until it cools down to be lukewarm. Add the chocolate into the egg mixture, beat with a mixer until the mixture is cool. Fold this mixture into the refrigerated whipping cream.

Cut the cake in half, soak both half with the orange syrup, then spread the chocolate mousse between the layers and on top. The mousse was runny at the beginning but it did get more solid after refrigerating.