Whole Clementine, Cranberry & Almond Cake

Clementines and fresh cranberries instantly conjure up images of Christmas and snowy winter days. They are only available for a few weeks of the year, so it’s important to celebrate them while they are here.

This cake is fabulously moist, with an almost frangipane texture and a fresh, sweet, citrusy flavour in each bite. It’s slightly unusual as it’s made using cooked and pureed whole clementines - peel, skin, flesh and all. This golden puree adds moistness and a wonderful fresh, zesty flavour to the cake.

A scattering of chopped fresh cranberries hide, nestled amongst the cake, shining out like vibrant ruby jewels when the cake is cut. Their tart zingy flavour adds a delicious contrast against the clementines natural sweetness.

The cake is quite cilosely textured, damp and incredibly moist making it ideal to serve for dessert as well as afternoon tea. I love how it also improve with age, becoming sticker as the ingredients mingle and meld together.

 

It’s also the perfect recipe to have in your repertoire as its naturally gluten and dairy free! Many people are nervous about gluten free baking, but this cake is made using natural familiar ingredients, so you don’t need to worry about buying any special ingredients. It’s the perfect example of how uncomplicated gluten and dairy free baking can be. The most exotic ingredient is the cranberries. More importantly it’s simple to make and amazingly delicious to eat.

Whole Clementine, Cranberry & Almond Cake

Ingredients
2 clementines, around 170g total

80g fresh cranberries

125g caster sugar
3 eggs
120g ground almonds

25g cornflour
½ tsp gluten free baking powder
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp ground ginger

Decoration

1 tsp icing sugar

1 clementine, zest

Few extra cranberries to decorate

Method
Grease a 6 inch spring form tin with oil and line the base with greaseproof paper. Preheat the oven to 180C.

Place the fresh cranberries into a food processor and pulse briefly until roughly chopped but still chunky. Transfer the cranberries to a separate bowl and set aside.
Wash the clementines and place in a microwavable bowl, fill with water until the fruit is mostly covered. Loosely cover the top of the bowl with clingfilm and microwave on high for 7 minutes. (Alternatively, boil in a pan of water for 30 minutes, until soft).
Use oven gloves to remove the bowl from the microwave and drain off the water. Cut the clementines in half, remove the green stalk, any pips and chop roughly.
Place the entire clementines (peel and all), in a food processor along with the sugar and whizz to a pulp, scraping down the sides once or twice. A few larger shreds are fine.

With the mixer running, add the eggs, one at a time, and whizz until pale and foamy.

Sift in the corn flour and add the baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, ginger and almonds. Whiz together until a smooth batter is formed. There will still be a few shreds of clementine visible in the batter, which is fine.

Fold in the roughly chopped cranberries and pour the cake mixture into the prepared tin. Bake for 40 minutes. It should be slightly risen and springy to the touch.
Allow the cake to cool for 30 minutes in the tin, before turning out and leaving to cool completely.

To decorate, dust the top of the cake with icing sugar. Grate over a little extra clementine zest and decorate with a few extra cranberries.

Makes 1 x 6 inch cake

Serves 8

Stir Up, Stir Up! Gluten Free Christmas Pudding!

This Sunday is officially Stir Up Sunday. It is the last Sunday before advent starts in December and is the day where everyone should stir up and steam their Christmas Puddings!

I have made Christmas puddings twice before, once pre coeliac diagnosis and once last year when I made it for the rest of the family, but couldn’t eat it myself. This year, as I’d been tasked with making it again, I decided it was going to be a gluten free Christmas Pud. Since moving out of my parents home a few months ago, my kitchen is a dedicated gluten free zone. No wheat or gluten is allowed through my front door!

I was having a chat about Christmas Puddings with my boss at work, who is also coeliac. We were discussing the recipes we use, and both of us were saying we had the best recipe. The next thing I knew an email had gone round the office saying that she and I were going to have a Christmas Pudding competition, and everyone is invited along to taste and vote for a winner! Yikes! No pressure then! (I somehow forgot to mention I’d never made a GF version of the pud before – but I’m never one to pass up a cooking challenge!)

Christmas Pudding is not too dissimilar to Christmas Cake. Your soak your fruits in alcohol before using them, like a Christmas cake, but you then mix these into a spiced breadcrumb and suet batter. This year I made my own breadcrumbs from some gluten free bread and used frozen grated butter in place of the suet (which is coated in wheat flour). This fruity, spicy mixture is placed into a pudding basin and part boiled, part steamed for several hours in a pan of simmering water. This produces a very moist and soft pudding, which has all the flavours of Christmas cake only in a squishier, softer form. The pudding mix doesn’t look all that appetising before it’s steamed, but it transforms into a lovely dark and sticky pudding after its steaming session, not to mention filling the house with a fabulous rich and spicy Christmas scent. It’s currently wrapped up tight and hidden away in a cupboard until its big reveal on Christmas Day.

Like Christmas Cake, the pudding is kept for several weeks to allow the flavour to mature and develop. Then on Christmas day the pudding is heated, doused in Brandy and set alight! The lights are quickly turned down and people ‘ohhh’ and ‘arrrrh’ as wispy blue flames dance around the pudding creating a spectacular end to the Christmas meal. There can’t be many foods that people look forward to intentionally setting on fire! The only other one I can think of is Baked Alaska and that’s more of a gentle torching rather than dousing it in a flammable liquid and setting light to it! However, the actually flames last mere seconds, so no harm comes to the pudding itself, its too moist to get scorched or burnt.

The pudding requires 5 hours of boiling/steaming, but don’t let that put you off. As long as you check the water level a couple of times during cooking, it can be left to its own devises. The actual making of the pudding is very quick and easy and the aroma of Christmas that fills your house as it happily steams away is sensational. My kitchen smelt all festive for 3 whole days. I’m really looking forward to Christmas now!

Gluten Free Christmas Pudding

Ingredients
230g raisins
125g sultanas
50g glace cherries (check they are gf)
Zest of 1 lemon
Zest of 1 orange
100ml Brandy (I used 60ml Brandy & 40ml Amaretto)
20g chopped pecans
50g grated frozen butter
30g gluten free brown breadcrumbs
50g gluten free plain flour
90g dark soft brown sugar
½ tsp mixed spice
½ tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground star anise (or clove)
½ tsp salt
2 eggs, lightly beaten

Method
The day before (or up to 3 days before), chop the cherries in half and place into a bowl along with the rest of the dried fruits. Grate the orange and lemon zest over the top and pour in the Brandy. Give everything a good stir, cover the bowl with clingfilm and set aside for 24 hours (or up to 3 days) to allow the fruits to plump up and absorb some of the Brandy.
The next day, place all the remaining ingredients into a large bowl. Add the soaked fruits, scraping in any leftover juices. Mix together lightly with a wooden spoon until everything is evenly combined.
Place a small disc of parchment paper in the base of a 1½ pint pudding basin. Fill the basin with the pudding mix, pressing down lightly. Place another disc of parchment on top and cover the top of the basin with a sheet of foil. Fold a little crease into the middle of the foil to allow the pudding to rise during steaming.
Tie a long strip of string around the top rim of the pudding and then secure it over the top of the basin from one side to the other to form a string handle. (This will help you retrieve the pudding from the pan later without burning yourself).
Lay sheets of newspaper in the base of a large saucepan. (This protects the base of the pudding from the direct heat from the stove and stops it rattling around inside your pan.) Place the pudding on the papers before filling the pan with boiling water from the kettle, until it reaches halfway up the side of the pudding basin.
Bring the water to a boil, then reduce to the merest of simmers, cover with the lid and leave to simmer gently for 5 hours. It should be barely bubbling.
Every 2 hours lift the lid of the pan to check the water level. Add more boiling water if it’s looking low.
Once the 5 hours is up, lift the pudding out of the pan with the help of the string handle. Place on a cooling rack, remove the foil and leave until cool. Leave it in the basin and with the parchment disc still on top. Once cooled, wrap the whole pudding, basin and all, tightly in clingfilm and store in a cool dark place until required, the longer the better.
On Christmas Day, steam the pudding again for 2 hours to heat through thoroughly. Turn out onto a serving plate that has a rim. Carefully warm a ladleful of Brandy, then set light to it with a match or lighter and quickly pour it over the pudding to flambé. Serve with Brandy butter or custard once the flames have extinguished.
Makes 1 pudding, to serve 6 – 8 people

Babycakes Baked Cake Doughnuts

Believe it or not these doughnut, or donuts as they call them at Babycakes, are gluten, wheat, egg, soy, dairy and nut free. They are also vegan. I should think they are suitable for almost anyone! I tried an authentic Babycakes donut when I was in LA back in February and it was love at first bite. Upon my return I promptly bought a copy of their cookery book. This weekend I finally got organized enough to bake a batch of doughnuts!

Babycakes is American, but as I bought their cookery book here in the UK I was delighted to discover they had adapted the recipes to be with UK grams rather than cups. They also give suggestions for alternative flours and ingredients when a recipe calls for some that aren’t available in the UK. Great stuff!

The doughnut batter is more like a cake batter rather than a dough and I actually piped the mixture into the tins. I did still have to adapt the recipe ever so slightly, as I didn’t have any potato starch so used white teff flour instead. I also substituted sunflower oil for the coconut oil called for as I have yet to find these in the shops. Oh and I made my own unsweetened apple sauce from a Bramley apple as not sure unsweetened apple sauce is even available in the UK. The apple puree adds moistness and structure to the finished doughnut without any detectable taste of apple, so don’t let that put you off.

The resulting donuts were soft and did have a slightly fried doughy flavour which was lovely; I think the combination of flours helped this. They didn’t puff up quite as much as I would have liked and they were not as moist as the one I had in LA, but for a first attempt they were delicious. So delicious in fact I ate 4 on the day I baked them! Best made the day they are baked and all that… I expect Babycakes has got a few tricks of the trade they use to make them extra moist and fluffy. I expect being able to find coconut oil would have helped, I'll have to experiment.

After baking I had the fun task of choosing toppings. I decided on cinnamon sugar, lemon glaze and chocolate ganache. Mmmmmm. The doughnuts were nicely sweet by themselves and the cinnamon sugar added a nice touch of crunch and spice. They held together well on biting and were sturdy enough to hold in one hand without falling to pieces, a must for that authentic doughnut experience. No one wants to have to eat their doughnut with a plate and fork!

My favourite one was actually the chocolate ganache topped doughnut. This surprised me as I would have probably put that last on my list before tasting them. The combination of smooth bitter chocolate against the sweet doughy doughnut was a lovely combination. The ganache also made it extra moist when allowed to sit for a few hours.

If you’ve been craving baked doughnuts, this recipe is definitely a good place to start.

Baked Cake Doughnuts

(Recipe from Babycakes Covers the Classics by Erin McKenna)

Ingredients

75ml melted coconut oil (I used sunflower)

160g caster sugar

100g white or brown rice flour (I used brown)

40g garbanzo bean flour (gram/chickpea flour)

70g potato starch (I used white teff flour)

30g arrowroot

1½ tsp gluten free baking powder

½ tsp xanthan gum

1/8 tsp bicarbonate of soda

6 tbsp unsweetened apple sauce (about 90g, see below)

2 tsp vanilla extract

125ml hot water

Method

Preheat the oven to 170C. Grease 2 large 6 ringed doughnut trays.

Add the sugar to a large bowl. Sift over the flours, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder, xanthan gum and arrowroot. Mix together briefly.

Add the apple puree, vanilla, oil and hot water. Beat together well using a spatula until combined and no streaks of flour remain.

Spoon 2-3 teaspoons of batter into each mould and smooth out to fill. (I piped mine into the moulds using a piping bag, which made it very easy).

Bake the doughnuts for 8 minutes, then rotate the tins and bake for a further 5-6 minutes until ever so slightly golden brown in colour.

Allow the doughnuts to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out of the tin onto cooling racks.

If coating the doughnuts in sugar, do this straight away while they are still warm. Otherwise, allow to cool for 15 minutes before coating in the icings and toppings of your choice.

Makes 12 baked doughnuts

Homemade unsweetened apple sauce/puree

Peel, core and finely dice a large-ish Bramley apple. Add 1 tbsp water and either lightly cook in a small saucepan until smooth and completely broken down, or else blast it in the microwave for about 3 minutes. Smoosh into a puree with the back of a spoon. Allow to cool slightly before weighting out the amount required.

Intensely Chocolaty Mousse

This is the best chocolate mousse I have ever made/eaten. It’s rich and intensely chocolaty, but also incredibly light and…moussey. The whole thing can be made from start to finish in about 15 minutes and what’s even more amazing is that it’s made with only 4 ingredients and one of those is water!

I invited a friend round for dinner with only a few hours notice, meaning it was a matter of ‘what can I make using the ingredients I have!?’ I did a simple stir fry for the main course, it’s amazing what a bit of ginger and chili can do to some rice and vegetables, but I wanted something more special for dessert.

I had a quick flick through some recipes and settled on Delia’s recipe for chocolate mousse. It needed only a few ingredients and seemed very simple to prepare. Plus I loved how I could make it straight away and leave it to sit in the fridge until required, meaning no last minute panic in the kitchen. 

The results were amazing! It was so quick and simple to make and tasted divine. Packed full of chocolate flavour yet still wonderfully light for a dessert. It contains no cream meaning it’s not too heavy or sickly and no marshmallows or gelatin so it wasn’t sticky or overly sweet. In fact its vegetarian, gluten free and also dairy free if you use a high enough percentage dark chocolate. As this mousse is basically melted chocolate lightened with some whipped egg whites, a rich intense dark chocolate is the way to go.

I also added a splash of rum to my mousse for an extra after dinner indulgence, but it’s just as fabulous without it. I loved how when you took a spoonful the mousse let out a little squish sound as you broke through the air bubbles. It just melted on the tongue.

Do give this chocolate mousse a go. People often say simple is best, and this chocolate mousse is the perfect example of that.

On a separate note, I’ve just changed computers and lost my usual photo editing programme and don’t like this new one at all! I can’t get it to do what I want. Can anyone recommend a good one? Preferably free and easy to use. Just simple applications like brightness and contrast, I’m not after anything fancy! Thanks.

Intensely Chocolaty Mousse

(Recipe from How to Cook by Delia Smith)

Ingredients

200g dark chocolate – 70% cocoa

120ml water

3 eggs, separated

40g caster sugar

1 tbsp rum or liquor of choice (my addition)

Method

Place a glass bowl over the top of a saucepan filled with gently simmering water. Break the chocolate into small pieces and place into the bowl along with the 120ml water and rum if using. (if you add cold water to unmelted chocolate they will melt together into a lovely glossy mixture. Don’t try and add any water to chocolate that’s already melted, or it will seize into a horrible mess). Allow to melt and combine gently, stirring occasionally until you have a glossy mixture.

Meanwhile, separate your eggs, placing the whites into a large clean bowl.

Remove the melted chocolate mixture from the heat. Lightly mix the egg yolks until they are broken and then add them a little at a time to the chocolate mixture. Stirring with a spatula until combined. (The chocolate will thicken)

Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form. Scatter over half the caster sugar and whisk again. Add the remaining sugar and whisk until the egg whites start to form stiff peaks.

Fold a third of the whisked egg white mixture through your chocolate mixture, stirring with large folding strokes, until no streaks remain.

Add half the remaining egg white mixture and fold in more gently, before adding the last of the egg whites. Do not over mix or you will knock out all the air.

The chocolate mixture will be quite soft and runny at this stage.

Carefully pour the chocolate mousse into 6 serving glasses and place in the fridge to set for at least 2 hours. (Can be made the day before)

When ready to serve, decorate with a little whipped cream or a fine grating of white chocolate.

Eat and enjoy

Makes 6 individual mousses

The Cake Slice September 2012: Chocolate Peanut Butter Mousse Cake

I was so excited when this month’s winning cake was this Chocolate Peanut Butter Mousse Cake. I am a great lover of peanut butter and have been rooting/voting for peanut butter cake creations for several years, every time one happens to come up for the vote. Usually, they are outvoted, but this month it won – hurrah!

I have issues with this recipe being labeled as ‘cake.’ There is no baked element in the dessert and nothing spongy about it. To me it is more of a mousse torte or layered cream…pie? Seeing how this is a cake baking group and it’s listed in the book as a mousse cake, I’ve decided to leave it as ‘cake’

The ‘cake’ itself was quite time consuming to make, being made up of 4 different layers, all which needed mixing and chilling separately. It starts out with a chocolate biscuit base, followed by a creamy peanut butter mousse, topped a dark chocolate mousse and finished with a dark chocolate glaze and a scattering of salted peanuts. Sound good, doesn’t it?!

I’ve made desserts in the past that were quite time consuming and when eaten, they are nice, I’ve felt they weren’t really worth the effort. This mousse cake however, was fabulous and worth every second of preparation. I loved the contrast between the crisp biscuit base and the rich and creamy mousse layers. The peanut butter flavour really shone through and worked so well against the dark chocolate elements. Slightly sweet, but then also a lingering saltiness from both the nuts on top and the peanut butter itself. A delicious creamy, crunchy, sweet and salty combination.

The recipe called for smooth peanut butter, but I only had slightly crunchy peanut butter on hand and I think this actually worked to the cakes advantage. Having a few chips of peanut actually in the mousse layer gave it some texture, as otherwise I think the thick peanut butter and chocolate mousse layers might have been a bit too soft and airy with nothing to bite on. I loved being able to distinguish the different layers.

The cake could probably have done with being left to set overnight rather than just an hour as it was still a little soft on serving, but this didn’t stop it tasting fabulous. Anything peanut butter is a winner in my books and paired against the rich dark chocolate mousse, ganache and base, it was delicious. I also loved that the only element I needed to adapt to make it gluten free was the base, and that the mousse didn’t contain any gelatin, meaning its vegetarian too! A winning ‘cake’ all round.

Next month, October, is our last cake baked from our current cake book by Tish Boyle, and we’re all going to bake the cake of our choice. Then in November we’ll be starting a brand new book for the upcoming year. Now I just need to decide which recipe to choose!

As this is nearly our last cake from our current cake book, we are now opening up group to fellow cake baking enthusiasts who wish to bake with us for the upcoming year. Places are limited and you will need to buy a copy of the new cake book to participate, so dedicated bakers only please.
Anyone wishing to join us can email my new co-host Paloma at (love.for.coffee[AT]gmail.com) along with their name, blog name, blog URL and email address for details. Please put ‘New Cake Slice Member’ in the subject box

Click here to see the Cake Slice blogroll

Chocolate Peanut Butter Mousse Cake

(Recipe from The Cake Book by Tish Boyle)

Chocolate Cookie Crust

180g chocolate cookies (I used GF shortbread cookies)

55 g unsalted butter, melted

10g cocoa powder (my addition as my cookies were plain)

Peanut Butter Mousse

142g cream cheese, softened

30g unsalted butter, softened

144g icing sugar

200g creamy peanut butter (I used finely ground crunchy)

¼ tsp salt

400ml double cream

Chocolate Mousse

142g dark chocolate, chopped

100g milk chocolate, chopped

200ml double cream

80ml whole milk

65g caster sugar

1tsp vanilla extract

Chocolate Glaze

85g dark chocolate

80ml double cream

Garnish

Few chopped salted peanuts

Chocolate Biscuit Base

Have ready a deep 9inch springform pan.

Either blitz the biscuits in a food processor, or put them in a bag and bash them into crumbs using a rolling pin. (Stir through the cocoa powder if using vanilla or plain biscuits) Once crushed, melt the butter, drizzle over the biscuit crumbs and mix well. Press the mixture into the base of the tin and press down into an even layer.

Place in the fridge to firm up while you make the peanut butter mousse.

Peanut Butter Mousse

Beat the cream cheese and butter together until creamy, about 1 minute. Add the icing sugar and mix until well blended. Add the peanut butter and salt and mix until well  combined.

In a clean bowl whisk the double cream at high speed until soft peaks form. Beat half the double cream into the peanut butter mixture using a spatula. Once combined, gently fold the remaining cream in the peanut butter mixture, mixing until no streaks remain.

Spread the mousse onto the chilled biscuit base and spread into an even layer. Refrigerate while you make the chocolate mousse.

Chocolate Mousse

Place the chopped chocolate into a bowl. In a small saucepan, combine the milk and sugar and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring frequently until the sugar dissolves. Pour the hot milk over the chocolate and stir until the chocolate is completely melted. Stir through the vanilla extract and set aside to cool slightly.

Beat the double cream until soft peaks form. Fold a third into the chocolate mixture and mix well. Follow this by half of the remaining cream and finally the last of the cream. Beat again with an electric mixture to help aerate the chocolate until slightly thickened.

Spread the chocolate mixture over the top of the chilled peanut butter mousse and place in the fridge to set for at least an hour.

Chocolate Glaze

Once the chocolate mousse layer is set, make the chocolate glaze.

Place the chocolate into a small bowl. Heat the cream until steaming hot, but not boiling, and then pour this over the chocolate. Stir gently until the chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth and glossy.

Allow to cool for 15 minutes before using.

Decorate

Run a sharp thin-bladed knife under hot water and wipe dry, then run the knife between the cake and the side of the pan to release the cake; reheat the knife as necessary. Remove the side of the pan. Pour the glaze over the top of the cake and spread out over the surface. Try not to let it drip down the sides. (I spread my glaze on the cake while it was still in the tin, sprinkled it with the peanuts and then let it set for a smoother finish).

Sprinkle the top of the cake with the peanuts and chill in the fridge for at least 1 hour before serving.

To serve, slice the cake with a hot knife, wiping it clean between each cut.

Store in the fridge and eat within 3 days.

Makes a 9inch mousse cake

Note: I halved this recipe and made it in a 6inch round tin.

Plum & Apple Crumble

When my parents came for a visit last weekend, they bought with them a whole assortment of goodies from home. Some freshly dug potatoes, tomatoes, green beans, some Discovery apples and Victoria plums. As the fruit was home grown, some of it was a little bruised from where it had fallen off the tree, not the best for eaten au-natural, but perfect for baking with.

Apple and plum are a classic combination and when thinking about classic English desserts, at the top of the list must be the much loved crumble. Its amazing how a few crumbs strewn over the top of lightly cooked fruit can taste so good. Who doesn’t love crumble?

You can of course jazz crumbles up no end with fancy flavour combinations, pear and chocolate chip, spring instantly to mind, not something my mother or grandmother would ever have eaten together in a crumble, as traditionally crumbles were purely fruit based. I decided to stick with a good old fashioned crumble and top mine with a simple butter, sugar and flour mixture. I added a few buckwheat flakes (in place of my mothers usual oats) and a pinch of cinnamon, a spice always welcomed by any fruit.

It took around 10 minutes to put together, meaning in only half an hour I was happily tucking into a taste of home and childhood. Soft, juicy fruit complimented by the toasted buttery crumbs…bliss.

If you like to add some ‘sauce’ to your crumble, it must be custard. There is no room for debate on this – keep that cream and ice cream away from me! It’s either custard or nothing at all. I had my first portion of crumble au-natural, as I couldn’t wait to make custard! As it’s just me eating this, there was a portion left, and I made the effort to make some custard for that bit. I'm not sure which way I prefer.

Plum & Apple Crumble

Fruit

300g Victoria plums

200g Discovery apples

1 tbsp water

3 tsp caster sugar

Crumble Topping

20g butter

20g brown rice flour

10g fine ground cornmeal or ground almonds (not cornflour)

20g buckwheat flakes (or GF oats)

15g caster sugar

½ tsp cinnamon

2 tsp almond liqueur (or 2 drops almond extract)

Method

Preheat the oven to 190C.

Peel and core the apples and cut into 2cm chunks. Remove the stones from the plums and slices into quarters or eights depending on size. Place the apple into a pan with the water and heat gently until the apples are just beginning to soften. Add the plums and sugar and cook for only 3-4 minutes, until the fruit is just beginning to go soft and fluffy as the edges. You don’t want complete mush!

Transfer the fruit to a deep 6 inch round ovenproof dish and set aside.

For the crumble, place the butter and all the other ingredients, expect the almond liqueur, into a small bowl and rub together using the tips of your fingers. Lift your fingers up above the bowl as your rub the mixture together, letting the crumble mix fall back into the bowl, just like when making pastry. It doesn’t have to be completely fine, a few largish lumps are good.

Add the almond liqueur or extract and mix again briefly.

Scatter the crumble topping over the surface of the fruit. Place the dish on a baking tray to catch any juices that may bubble over.

Bake in the oven for 18-20 minutes, until lightly golden brown and bubbling around the edges.

Allow to sit for 5 minutes before serving.

Serves 2

The Cake Slice June 2012: Brooklyn Blackout Cake

This cake is rich, intensely chocolaty, fudgy, moist and decedent. It’s almost black, brownie-like layers are sandwiched together with a smooth, bitter chocolate cream, before being covered in a sweet dark chocolate frosting and scattered with some reserved cake crumbs….it’s dark and mysterious and utterly divine.

This cake is too good to be simply labelled as a ‘cake.’ In my eyes this is not cake. It’s a sort of torte, gateaux, truffle, brownie, dessert, cake hybrid. It’s a dessert for serious chocolate lovers and is so rich and sophisticated that it should come with an ‘adults only’ warning.

As last Sunday was Fathers day I saved baking this until then, when I could present it to my dad over dinner. This is such a dark, moody creation, that it seemed the perfect ‘manly cake’ – no light fluffy fruity layers here!

The cake was meant to be a 9inch cake, which is then cut into 3 layers. I decided to halve this recipe and baked the cake in a 6inch tin, which worked fine, although only resulted in 2 tiers, rather than 3. Not that this mattered. I then discovered I didn’t have enough eggs to make the filling, so substituted this was a dark chocolate ganache (a decadent cream and chocolate combo) that I suspect was even more indulgent than the proposed filling.

The cake layers themselves are very moist and fudgy. Almost middle of a brownie in consistency. Their deep dark colour comes from copious amounts of cocoa powder and some hot strong coffee. The coffee seems to really enhance the chocolate flavour, without being obviously coffee. The cake layers become even more sticky and fudgy as they are stored over time.

The outer frosting was quite sweet, but this acted as a nice contrast to the rich cake and bitter chocolate ganache filling. My mum was in rhapsodies over her slice. We all agreed it was fabulous and definitely more of a dessert than an afternoon tea cake. One I’ll be sure to bake again (think I’ll stick to my ganche filling too). I strongly recommend you giving a go!

Click here to see the list of my fellow Cake Slice bakers.

Brooklyn Blackout Cake

(Recipe adapted from The Cake Book by Tish Boyle)

Chocolate Blackout Cake

180g plain flour (I used Doves Farm plain GF)

80g cocoa powder

1½ tsp gf baking powder

1½ tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tsp salt

400g caster sugar

2 eggs

1 egg yolk

240ml buttermilk

115g butter, melted

2 tsp vanilla extract

240ml hot brewed coffee (you can use decaf)

Chocolate Filling *(see notes below for my ganche filling)

4 egg yolks

130g caster sugar

2 tbsp cornflour

1/8 tsp salt

240ml water

160m double cream

85g dark chocolate, finely chopped

1 tsp vanilla extract

Chocolate Frosting

115g dark chocolate, chopped

155g butter, softened

190g icing sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

Chocolate Blackout Cake

Preheat the oven to 180C. Grease and line two 9inch/22cm round cake tins.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add the sugar and mix until all the ingredients are blended.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, egg yolk, buttermilk, melted butter, and vanilla extract. While mixing the dry ingredients at low speed, add the egg mixture in a steady steam. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat for 1 minute, until well blended. (It will be quite thick)

Add the hot coffee and mix gently until combined. (It will now be very liquid)

Divide the batter between the prepared pans. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until starting to come away from the sides and firm to the touch. Cool the cakes in the tins before turning out.

Chocolate Filling

In the bowl, beat the egg yolks, sugar, cornflour and salt until pale, about 1 minute.

In a saucepan, combine the water and cream and bring to a boil before removing from the heat. Whisk half of the hot cream mixture into the yolk mixture, whisking constantly. Pour this mixture into the remaining cream in the saucepan. Cook over medium heat, whisking constantly, until the mixture comes to a boil. Continue to boil, whisking, for 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the chocolate until it is completely melted. Pass the filling through a fine-mesh sieve into a small bowl. Stir in the vanilla extract.

Cover the surface of the pudding with clingfilm and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, until chilled.

Chocolate Frosting

Melt the chocolate until smooth and set aside.

Beat the butter until creamy, before gradually adding in the icing sugar. Beat until it starts to form a buttercream.

Beat in the vanilla extract and the cooled chocolate, mixing until blended.

Assembly

Using a large serrated knife, cut the two chocolate cake layers in half, to create 4 layers. Set one layer aside and crumble half of it into crumbs to use as decoration later (you can eat the remaining bit).

Place one cake layer on a serving plate and spread over half of the filling. Top with another cake layer, the rest of the filling and the final cake layer. You should have a three-tiered cake at this stage.

Spread the chocolate frosting over the top and sides of the cake. Don’t worry about being too neat as its going to get covered in crumbs.

Scatter the saved cake crumbs over the top of the cake (sides too if you wish)

Serve immediately or store at room temperature for up to 3 days. The cake becomes even more moist and fudgy over time.

Notes:

* I halved this recipe and baked the cakes in 2 x 6inch tins. These made cakes a little too thin for cutting in half so my cake was only two-tiered instead of three.

* I didn’t have enough eggs to make the filling so I made a simple chocolate ganache using 160ml hot double cream, poured over 85g dark chocolate and stirred until smooth. Leave the ganache to cool and thicken before using – divine!

Jubilee Cheesecake

I hope everyone enjoyed the Jubilee weekend. I managed to see my parents, grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister and brother over the course of the 4 days, so it was a lovely family occasion.

My family is a very foodie family, not everyone enjoys cooking it, but we all certainly enjoy eating it and so there is always a selection of delicious food (homemade of course) to enjoy while we all catch up with each others news.

As well as my previously mentioned éclairs, my mum contributed a delicious vanilla cheesecake which we decorated together with blueberries and strawberries to resemble the Union Jack flag. This is a baked vanilla cheesecake with a layer of sour cream on top, added just before baking, to give it a slight tang. The cheesecake itself is baked in a bain-marie or water bath to ensure it stays fabulous smooth and creamy.

I don’t have many photos of it as we were all too eager to tuck in, but quite a considerable amount of it disappeared! It was a Nigella Lawson recipe and it seemed particularly fitting for the occasion as Nigella calls it a London cheesecake. GF biscuits were used for the base which meant I could enjoy it too. It was absolutely divine, velvety smooth and creamy.

My sister really outdid herself by baking a red, white and blue Union Jack puff pastry flag. She used roasted red peppers and tomatoes for the red, sliced feta cheese for the white and then some sliced new potatoes that she boiled in water, tinted blue with food dye as you couldn’t think of a savoury blue food. Talk about inventive! It looked stunning, well done C!

Unfortunately it wasn’t GF, but the whole thing got eaten so I assume it tasted good.

Jubilee Cheesecake

(Recipe from How to be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson)

Biscuit Base

150g gluten free digestive/tea biscuits

75g unsalted butter, melted

Cheesecake

600g cream cheese (check its GF)

150g caster sugar

3 eggs

3 egg yolks

1½ tablespoons vanilla extract (yes really!)

1½ tablespoons lemon juice

Topping

145ml tub sour cream

1 tablespoon caster sugar

½ tsp vanilla extract

Blueberries and strawberries to decorate

Method

Blitz the biscuits in a food processor until they are like crumbs, then add the butter and pulse again. Line the bottom of an 8inch/20cm springform tin and pressing the buttery biscuits into the base and press down firmly.

Put the tin in the fridge to set. Preheat the oven to 180C.

Beat the cream cheese gently until it's smooth, then add in the sugar. Beat in the eggs and egg yolks, then finally the vanilla and lemon juice. Fill the kettle and bring to the boil.

Warp the outside on the tin, base and up and sides, with one large sheet of strong foil. Repeat to ensure it is watertight. This will protect the cheesecake from the water as it is cooked in its water bath. Place the tin into a roasting dish.

Pour the cream cheese filling onto the chilled biscuit base. Pour hot water from the recently boiled kettle into the roasting tin, around the cheesecake, so that the water comes half way up the sides. It should not come over the top edges of your foil wrapping.

Carefully place into the oven and cook for 50 minutes, while you prefer the sour cream topping. After 50 minutes the cheesecake should be set on top, but still be soft and wobbly in the centre.

For the sour cream, whisk together the sour cream, sugar and vanilla and pour over the baked cheesecake. Put the cheesecake back in the oven for a further 10 minutes to set the topping.

Once baked, remove the wrapped cheesecake from the water bath and unwrap the foil. A little condensation/water on the foil is ok. Transfer the cheesecake, still in its tin, to a rack to cool.

When it's cooled down completely, place in the fridge to chill for at least 4 hours, although preferably overnight.

When ready to serve, run a sharp knife around the edge of the tin before unmoulding and transferring to a serving plate. Try heating the knife in hot water first to get a clean cut.

Decorate with berries or anything else you wish.

Makes 1 x 8inch cheesecake

GF Éclairs with Raspberry Crème Patisserie & White Chocolate - perfect for the Jubilee

I’m not doing anything special for the Jubilee, but that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a few red, white and blue themed treats to share with the family. I decided I wanted to try making some gluten free éclairs, something I have been putting off attempting for several months, as I was really unsure how they would turn out. I’d heard reports that some people had made some quite successful GF choux pastry and decided it was time I gave it a go myself.

I wanted to do something a bit different to traditional éclairs and so made a raspberry crème patisserie for the filling which I infused with Chambord, a fabulous French black raspberry liqueur combined with notes of citrus peel, honey and vanilla. I love its ruby red colour. I also added some good quality raspberry conserve for added flavour. This is richer, creamier and oh so much more indulgent than simply filling with some whipped cream, but it’s defiantly worth the extra effort for a special occasion. I could have (and did) eaten quite a bit of it by the spoonful – quality testing of course.

For decoration I wanted to tray and replicate the English flag, but thought this would probably be a little difficult to do on top of an éclair. Instead I simply coated the tops with melted white chocolate, piped on alternating lines of red and blue icing and then lightly dragged a cocktail stick through the lines to create a feather effect. This worked well and I loved the result with its curves of red, white and blue.

For some reason my choux pastry batter turned out a little too soft, meaning I had to add extra flour, which then created a few lumps in the batter. Drat. I carried on regardless and the resulting little choux pastry éclairs were quite tasty, if not perfectly formed. They did puff slightly in the oven and create the desired little hollows in the centre, but the space was not big enough to fill generously with the crème patisserie.. No one wants a stingy filled éclair and so I simply sandwiched two éclairs together, which allowed lots of delicious creamy filling. Crisis averted!

They looked so pretty set out on their plates. The GF buns themselves were fine, a little thick perhaps as they didn’t rise as they should have, but by no means gummy or gritty. The raspberry crème patisserie was divine, so indulgent and yet surprisingly light and airy. It wasn’t overly sweet, which I liked and is definitely worth the extra effort. The top coating of white chocolate added a nice hit of sweetness and went well with the raspberry filling. All in all delicious, although I need to work on my GF choux pastry. I used to make them all the time before having to go GF. Anyone have any GF choux tips?

Whatever you’re doing – I hope you have a wonderful Jubilee weekend!

GF Éclairs with Raspberry Crème Patisserie & White Chocolate

Pate a Choux

150 ml water
60g unsalted butter
¼ tsp salt
10g caster sugar
100g gluten free plain flour
3 eggs

MethodPreheat the oven to 220C. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicon paper.
Combine the water, butter, salt and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil, stir occasionally. Once boiling, remove from the heat and pour in the flour. Immediately beat vigorously to incorporate the flour and prevent lumps from forming until it forms a thick dough.
Return the dough to heat and cook, stirring constantly until the batter dries slightly and begins to pull away from the sides of the pan.
Transfer to a bowl and beat for 1 minute to cool slightly.
Add 1 egg and beat in well. The dough will break up into lumps and look shiny, but this is normal. Keep beating and it will come back together.
Repeat the process until you have incorporated all the eggs.
Transfer the batter to a pastry bag fitted with a large round nozzle. Pipe the choux about 1 inch-part on the baking sheets. Pipe out a short, fairly fat line of choux, about 2 inches long.

Spray a fine mist of water over the whole tray before placing in the oven. (The steam helps them puff up before a crust can form)
Bake at 220C for 10 minutes, until lightly golden.
Lower the temperature to 180C and continue baking until browned and dry, about 15 minutes more. The lower second tray may need a couple of minutes longer. Transfer to a cooling wire to cool.
Store in an airtight box until required.

Makes about 20-24 éclairs

Crème Patisserie
250ml whole milk
½ tsp vanilla extract
15g cornflour
50g caster sugar
2 large egg yolks
30g unsalted butter
200ml double cream
1 tbsp Chambord (Black raspberry liqueur)
2 tbsp raspberry conserve

Tiny amount pink food gel

Method
Pour the milk into a sauce pan and heat until steaming and near to boiling point.
Meanwhile, in another bowl, whisk the egg yolks, sugar and cornflour together. When the milk is ready, gently and slowly pour the heated milk down the side of the bowl into the egg mixture, whisking all the time.
Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and cook over a low heat until the custard is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, stirring constantly. Do not let it boil.
Remove from heat and pass through a fine sieve into a clean bowl. Beat in the vanilla. Allow to cool for ten minutes stirring occasionally.
Cut the butter into small pieces and whisk into the pastry cream a piece at a time until smooth.
Cover the cream with clingfilm, pressing it directly onto the surface of the cream to prevent a skin from forming. Chill in the fridge until completely cold.

When cold, whisk the cream until it forms stiff peaks, add the raspberry liqueur and whisk again to combine. Fold the cream into the pastry cream and beat in the raspberry conserve. Add a tiny pinprick of pink food gel to give it a pink blush, don’t overdo it though as you want it to look natural.

Refrigerate until ready to use.

To Decorate

80g white chocolate

2 x 40g icing sugar

Red and blue food dye

Method

Melt the white chocolate in a small bowl.

Divide the icing sugar into two separate small bowls. Mix into a stiff glace icing using 2 drops of water.

Colour each of the icings with red and blue food dye.

Place the dyed icings into small paper piping bags, made from rolled squares of greaseproof paper. Cut the ends off to create a small piping hole.

Coat the top of the éclairs with the melted white chocolate. Immediately pipe on alternating colours of the red and blue icings, in thin lines across the width of the éclair.

While everything is still soft, drag the point of a cocktail stick down the length of the éclair and up the other side, to create a feather effect.

Leave to set before filling with the raspberry crème patisserie and eating.