A Stout little cake

Well, the warm weather’s certainly taking its time to rouse itself.

I’ve just popped out to the village shops and a biting wind took me quite by surprise as I got out of the car.

After last week’s warm weather excitement, I’d started gearing myself up for some lighter cooking this week, but it seems like the slowcooker has earned itself another week’s freedom before heading into the cupboard until the Autumn.

Certainly for me, the weather affects my cooking enormously – miserable, blustery days demand satisfying comfort food, and blistering hot blue skies mean I won’t be standing over the stove much.

A quick grilling or, better still, barbecue-ing of something, and a tasty salad is all I’ll bother with.

For me, what I drink, like the food I eat, varies much according to the weather.

Wine-wise, in the colder months I find I put away much more red wine and dark spirits than in the Summer, when I’m all over the bone-dry rosés, crisp whites and gin drinks.

I’m no great beer drinker, but occasionally get a hankering, and the seasons affect my thirsts here, too.

Summer is about low-ABV amber ales, good lagers and nice crisp cider, and as the cold weather approaches, I find myself craving darker ales, bitters and stouts.

Which, conveniently, brings us to this week’s recipe, a delicious chocolate cake made with a rich, tasty stout.

Beer has been used in baking for many centuries, thanks largely to its wonderful leavening properties – think of those crispy, flavourful batters that one can make with lagers and golden ales.

And the rich, unique flavour of beers makes them perfect for stews, pies and casseroles.

The Belgian dish Carbonnade de Boeuf is one of my very favourites: chunks of tender beef in a rich sauce laced with tasty dark beer, topped with crisp croutons – gorgeous.

And a little beer in a fiery Texan chili certainly adds a new dimension.

In baking, too, a little beer here and there can make a really tasty difference, and this cake uses the rich, iron-y flavour of milk stout (so called because of the addition of the sweetener lactose) to permeate the batter, resulting in a dense, deeply chocolate-y cake with a little hint of that dark, magical ale.

Of course, you could select a dark beer rather than a stout, but here we’re really after a good flavour that can match the cocoa powder’s intensity.

I used a powerful stout, Brewdog’s ‘Jet Black Heart’, which really asserts itself, but any porter or stout, perhaps Guinness, will do fine.

To top the cake we’re making a standard cream cheese icing, which helps to cut through the richness with a welcome touch of cool, tangy dairy flavour and makes this a cake with a difference.

Pop open a bottle and let’s get baking, shall we?