There is one thing that the British Bake Off confirmed to me and that is there are a lot of things that I have no idea how to make. I was particularly in awe during ‘Biscuit’ week when John (who then went on to win Series 3) created a Coliseum.
It is half term this week which means there are two children under foot and that isn’t a bad thing. Yesterday the weather was rather miserable outside and it provided the perfect opportunity for a family baking event. Rather than cordon myself off in my own little baking world in the kitchen, I assigned tasks so we could add another chocolate cake recipe to our repertoire. I have two chocolate cake recipes that I have used over the years, in fact one recipe has dominated in the past.
The recipe came from this cookbook.
After reviewing Limoncello and Linen Water, I have become a Tessa Kiros fan.
This book came from the library. I found myself gravitating to the title given that it is called ‘Twelve’ and then sets out a year in cooking going through the year month by month. This recipe makes one 24 cm cake.
Ingredient List
200g good quality unsweetened dark chocolate
6 tablespoons milk
100g butter
4 eggs, separated
150 g caster sugar
50g cake flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
Method
Preheat oven to 180oC.
You start off by melting the broken up chocolate in a bowl over a pan of simmering water together with the milk and butter. Separate the eggs and combine the yolks with the caster sugar until thick and creamy. Then add the melted chocolate mixture to it.
Whisk in the sifted flour and baking powder. Whip the egg whites into soft peaks and fold them well into the mixture.
Then pour the mixture into a buttered cake tin and cook for approximately 35 minutes.
I dusted the cake with icing sugar as suggested and we saved diving into it until after dinner.
