Blackout

One of the custards we really wanted to try at Shake Shack this month was the blackout flavor. We really love Brooklyn blackout cake and were hoping it would capture that essence. If you're unfamiliar with blackout cake, it's multiple layers of devil's food cake with layers of chocolate pudding inbetween, topped with chocolate frosting and more cake crumbles. It's decadent but somehow also feels a little light. M grew up eating blackout cake and it's probably among her favorite types of cake. A didn't ever eat blackout cake until he got to NYC, but he fell in love with it.

M's thoughts:

I was hoping this would pick up on the cake-pudding combination that makes blackout cake so special, but it really just tasted like a double chocolate custard to me. A rich chocolate custard with rich chocolate cake pieces. The cake pieces were a little dense, more than blackout cake is, from what I remember. I'm not sure if that's because they were frozen into the custard or if they just came out denser since they probably weren't baked with pudding in an actual cake. If you're looking for a rich chocolate custard with texture, this is good, but it's no substitute for blackout cake.

A's thoughts:

This wasn't a perfect blackout cake substitute by any means. The chocolate custard was good and all, but it was just regular chocolate. The cake seemed oddly crispy as well. It's almost like they mixed in actual blackout cake pieces but they froze. I also couldn't taste any chocolate pudding in this, and that's the part of the blackout cake that I like the most. All that being said, though, I do still like this custard. It's impossible to live up to the expectations of an amazing blackout cake so it's not surprising that this fell a little short. It is a good flavor, and something I would probably get again.

Blackout

A's rating: 8/10

M's rating: 7.5/10