Chocolate Cake

To Elaine

I only have a few friends here in London, one of whom is Elaine. She loves chocolate, and I promised her a chocolate cake for her birthday. Originally we had our eyes on Nigella’s Old Fashioned Chocolate Cake. But when I tried to ‘road-test’ it, due to my own incompetence, namely, the failure to adjust the oven time for a different cake size, the cake turned out a tad too dense and dry. In the end, I opted for another route – a simple Victoria sponge with cocoa powder added. It came out wonderfully moist and fluffy. For the topping, I adapted Nigella’s soured cream icing with some Winnie the Pooh and Friends sugar pieces. Elaine was particular pleased with the Eyeore sugar piece on the cake!

Serves 4 -6

Ingredients
For chocolate sponge

1. 165g self-raising flour
2. 35g cocoa
3. 1 ½ teaspoon baking powder
4. 165g margarine (I used Stork)
5. 155g caster sugar
6. 3 eggs
7. 100ml milk

For chocolate soured cream icing

1. 45g unsalted butter
2. 100g dark chocolate
3. 100g icing sugar
4. 2 teaspoons golden syrup
5. 75ml soured cream
6. ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Method

• Grease two 6 inch round cake tins (with loose bottoms) and line with baking parchment.
• Preheat oven to 160c.
• Sieve flour, cocoa and baking powder in a bowl.
• In another bowl, place margarine, sugar, beaten eggs and milk and mix well.
• Beat in the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Beat until all ingredients are thoroughly combined.
• Spoon cake mixture into prepared cake tins, spreading evenly.
• Bake for about 35 minutes or until skewer comes out clean.
• Cool cake in tins on wire rack for 10 minutes and then turn out the cakes to cool completely.
• Meanwhile, prepare the chocolate icing by melting chocolate and butter in a bowl placed above a pan of simmering water (please make sure the water is not touching the base of the bowl). Let it cool for a while.
• Then, add golden syrup, sour cream and vanilla extract to the cooled chocolate mixture and stir well to combine.
• Sieve in icing sugar a little at a time and stir; check whether the icing is of your desired consistency and thickness. I found 100g of icing sugar to be more or less the right amount (I don’t want the icing turns rock-hard when cold).
• With serrated knife, cut each cake so that the top is level.
• Place one cake layer on a cake stand and spoon 1/3 mixture of the icing sugar on it, spreading evenly.
• Sit the other layer on top. Spoon another 1/3 of icing on the top and spread the rest to the sides of the cake. Use whatever tools you have to smoothen the top or simply use a dessertspoon to create a patterned top. Adorn the cake with your favourite sugar pieces.