Hot and Saucy Chocolate Pudding

The first thing I should say about this cake is that it's easy to make. It is also verrrrry chocolatey! However, it's not a dainty or pretty cake. It's the sort of cake that's like the favourite jumper that you have hiding in the wardrobe that's a bit worn and bobbly in places but is coseeeeey. This cake is like that - it's basically a hug in cake form.

I'm not usually bossy about the way that you should serve cakes, but this cake really does require pouring cream or ice cream to sit alongside it - this cake is a thick chocolate sauce gloop-fest and it really needs something to help it along - mint ice cream is yummy with it, or you could do as I did and serve it with decent vanilla ice cream and some strawberries...

For the cake:
150g self-raising flour
25g good quality cocoa (I use Green and Black's)
200g caster sugar ( a lot I know, but it serves 6)
50g ground hazelnuts or almonds - choice is yours
75g dark chocolate buttons or good quality chocolate roughly chopped
180ml full cream milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
40g butter, melted
1 free range egg.

For the sauce:

180g dark muscavado sugar
120g good quality cocoa
500ml boiling water

Pre-heat oven to 180 C/ 350 F/ Gas Mark 4.

1) Put all the dry ingredients for the cake together in a mixing bowl (flour, sugar, cocoa, ground nuts, chocolate pieces). Mix them together.

2) In a jug or separate bowl, whisk the milk, vanilla extract, melted butter and egg.

3) Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly.

4) Pour the cake batter into a buttered souffle dish or deep sided oven-proof dish (about 20cm in diameter).

5) Mix the muscavado sugar and cocoa together, then sprinkle on top of the pudding.

6) Pour the boiling water on top of the sugar and cocoa coated cake. Resist the temptation to stir the water into the lumps of cocoa and sugar. It really will be fine - I know this is scary, but trust me, it works!

7) Transfer swiftly and carefully to the oven and bake for 35-40 mins. When checking the cake, the watery cocoa and sugar mix should have disappeared into the cake and the top of the cake should be firm and springy. Don't be alarmed by the cratery nature of the cake - that's the sort of cake this is.  A knife or skewer inserted into the cake should come out fairly clean, with no batter clinging to it.

Like I said, this is a thick woollen jumper of a cake, as opposed to a fine cashmere knit.
Whilst  it's not pretty, it tastes gooooood! 

8) Serve at once with chilled pouring cream or ice cream. Berries such as strawberries, raspberries or blackberries can also come to the cake party if you like!

The Artful Dodger

A few weeks ago, I bought a beautiful pottery rolling pin from an antique shop in Holmfirth. It gave me the excuse I needed to get some jammie dodgers and cookies made: pronto! It also gave me the excuse to buy this book from Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pie-Angela-Boggiano/dp/1845334892/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1337029414&sr=8-1 which makes me go mmmmmmm with every page turn!

So, back to the biscuits! I decided I wanted to make heart shaped jammie dodgers and so checked out a recipe via Cherry Menlove's blog. Cherry Menlove is Britain's swishy haired answer to Martha Stewart - a bit like Marmite as she does divide opinion but I tend to think that her blog can be viewed as tongue-in-cheek, rather than in earnest. I also reckon you'll see her on TV soon, so remember her cool name if you haven't heard of her before.

The rolled out dough is stamped into heart shapes.

The hearts are paired off on to a greased baking tray and the
interior heart is stamped out.

Once the biscuits have been cooked and cooled they can be sandwiched together with good quality jam to make yummy jammie dodgers! I tend to use Wilkins and Sons jams as I think they are the tastiest jams and have the best range of flavours. We tend to have strawberry and raspberry as there is debate over which is the better fruit in our house.

If I'm honest, I think Cherry's biscuit dough is a bit too buttery and soft - I do prefer a more crunchy sort of biscuit, but with a tweak and here and there, it would be perfect. I added some vanilla bean paste to my dough which I loved and would do again.

I also made a batch of gooey chocolatey chip cookies using the recipe from the cookery book of my childhood...

I just replaced the milk chocolate chips in the recipe with the same amount of roughly chopped Green and Black's Dark 70% chocolate - why go to the trouble of making your own cookies to fall at the last fence by scrimping on the chocolate?

They came out of the oven looking and tasting pretty damn fine!

Cake Love

Recently, people have asked me if I will be buying or making my own wedding cake. In my dreams, where money is no object, I'm catching a train to London to make the pilgrimage to Peggy Porschen's pink parlour in Belgravia to beg her to make me a cake like this...

Then I wake up!

There is no way that we can afford a Peggy Porschen cake and I should say right away that there's no way I can make sugar roses as beautiful and realistic as this, but I do like the idea of baking our wedding cake. It seems natural for me to consider it as baking and cakes consume most of my thoughts and I would want a lot of input into the design of the cake anyway. I will need to practise and experiment until I have the sort of quality and finish that I would be happy with but this also is a good thing for Becky BakesWell anyway.

People who know me, also know of my love for polka dots and anything Cath Kidston related, so these cake ticks boxes for me!

However, as our wedding is at Christmas this sort of design could be lovely - especially as it means I get to make royal icing snowflakes, which I love to do.

I do love Peggy Porschen cakes though and her Paris themed cake would also fit in nicely if we did decide to go ahead with plans to stay in Paris for our honeymoon...

Just as I think I have pinned down what I like though, I start to consider cupcakes and a small cake as a top tier!

 Feel free to share the cake love by posting any ideas or photos of cakes for inspiration that you think are pretty and unusual. 

Becky Bakeswell x