Choc and awe

ULTIMATE CHOCOLATE FUDGE CAKE

INGREDIENTS (Serves 10-12)

For the sponge layers: 250g plain chocolate; 275g soft butter (I prefer salted butter in a chocolate cake); 300g light muscovado sugar (I love using light muscovado sugar because it’s unrefined and it gives a naturally fudgy, caramel flavour); 2tsp vanilla bean paste;

5 medium free-range eggs; 200g soured cream; 225g self raising flour sifted and whisked with ½tsp baking powder; 40g cocoa powder For the frosting: 400g dark chocolate; 220g double cream; 400g soft salted butter; 800g icing sugar (I prefer unrefined as it’s caramel tasting but you can use regular);

2tsp vanilla paste

METHOD

1. To make the sponges, gently melt your chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl on a medium heat for 30 seconds at a time, stirring until just melted. This could also be done over a bain marie. Leave to cool while getting on with the next bit.

2. Preheat your oven to 180˚C/ 160˚C fan/gas mark 4. In a stand mixer with the paddle beater attachment, with an electric hand beater or by hand, cream the butter, sugar and vanilla paste together until pale and fluffy.

3. Start for a couple of minutes on slow speed. Once the sugar is mixed in, turn to a medium/high speed. By hand will take a good 10 minutes.

4. Reduce the speed to slow and gradually add the egg until it is amalgamated, occasionally scraping down the side of the bowl (stop the machine, of course!) to make sure you’ve got all the butter and sugar. Don’t worry if it looks a bit curdled, this will disappear when you add the flour and cocoa.

5. Keeping the mixer on slow, pour in the melted chocolate and mix. If doing by hand, mix in in three or four increments and stir gently. Add the soured cream, mixing on slow for 20 seconds or so (or stir).

6. Lastly, in a separate bowl, whisk the cocoa into the flour. Add this to the chocolate mixture in about three increments and gently mix on slow just until the powdery flour is mixed in. Do not over beat, or your sponge might be heavy.

7. Now spoon a third of the mixture into each tin and level off each with a spoon. Pop in the oven for 20-25 minutes or until just baked. A testing knife should come out of the centre of the sponge with a little cake mix on it, and the cakes should be shrinking away from the tin edge a bit. Check after 15 minutes to be safe as all ovens vary. Remove and cool in the tins for 10 minutes then turn out on to a wire rack, remove the paper and leave to cool.

8. To make the ganache frosting, in a microwave, melt the chocolate and cream together in a bowl for 30 seconds at a time on a medium heat, stirring in between each burst, or do this over a bain marie. Leave to cool for 30 minutes to an hour.

9. Once the cakes and ganache are cool, in a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, beat the butter, sugar and vanilla on a slow speed until combined, then increase the speed to high and beat until pale and fluffy. Mix 250g of the cooled ganache into the buttercream for a milk chocolate frosting. Set the rest of the ganache to one side.

10. Stick together your cake boards with a little buttercream, ensuring the smaller one is central on top. Put a little buttercream in the centre of the small cake board and place your first cake sponge on top, in the centre. Layer the cake with 250g buttercream per layer, ensuring you put the third and last sponge, base side up. Using palette knives, add a thin layer of frosting to seal the surface, ensuring no crumbs go back into the milk chocolate frosting bowl this will be used for the ombre layers. Chill for an hour to firm up.

11. To create the ombre layers, you’ll create three different chocolate shades.

12. For the light shade, put 300g of the milk chocolate frosting into a piping bag; for the medium shade, mix 125g of the remaining ganache into the remaining milk chocolate frosting. Put 200g of this mixture into a second piping bag. Then for the dark shade, mix the remaining ganache and buttercream from the step above and put this into a third piping bag. Snip a ½cm hole at the point of each piping bag.

13. With the dark shaded frosting, pipe a few dark rings around the bottom of the cake, coming up to a third of the height of the cake.

14. Now start to pipe rings of medium shaded frosting, to come up to two thirds of the height of the cake. Lastly, pipe rings around the top third of cake and top of the cake using the light shade of frosting.

15. To finish, use a palette knife to flatten and smooth the top, then a large damp cake scraper on the sides to sweep around and across the three shades of frosting to create a flat three tone chocolate coating.