Lisa Faulkner’s easy chocolate cake recipe
Recipes From My Mother For My Daughter, published by Simon & Schuster
Recipes From My Mother For My Daughter, published by Simon & Schuster
"Whenever it was anyone's birthday, my mum would make this cake. It seemed to take her no time at all, and if it wasn't cut into all sorts of different shapes for whatever 'theme' we wanted, then it would be iced with shiny chocolate. It would always look pretty when she did this, and I often thought I would like that for my birthday cake, but for some reason I never told her that."
Serves: 8-10
Preparation time: 20 minutes, excluding icing
Cooking time: 20 minutes
Ingredients
For the cake:
175g (6oz) unsalted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
175g (6oz) caster sugar
3 large eggs
175g (6oz) self-raising flour
1½ tsp baking powder
2 tbs drinking chocolate
1 tbs warm water
For the filling:
125g (4oz) icing sugar
1½oz unsalted butter, softened
1 tbs whole milk
For the icing:
250g (8oz) dark chocolate, broken into pieces and melted
15g (½oz) unsalted butter, softened
To decorate (optional):
Glacé cherries, halved
Sliced almonds
Method
- Preheat the oven to 180C (350F), gas mark 4 and grease two 20cm (8 inch) shallow cake tins.
- Mix all of the cake ingredients together in a large mixing bowl until thoroughly amalgamated. Pour into the prepared cake tins and shake gently to level the surface.
- Bake the cakes in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until the top springs back when pushed with your finger. Turn the cakes out onto a wire rack and leave to cool.
- Meanwhile, make the filling and the icing. Mix all of the filling ingredients together in a mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, stir the melted chocolate and the butter together and beat well until thoroughly mixed.
- When the cakes are cool, lay one of the shallow layers on a serving plate. Spread the filling mixture across the cake and top with the second layer. Spread the icing on the top half of the cake and use a palette knife to smooth it out and down the sides until it is all completely covered. Decorate with glacé cherries and almonds, if liked.
Recipe taken from Recipes From My Mother For My Daughter, published by Simon and Schuster
Lisa Faulkner has teamed up with Laterooms.com to help create inspirational suggestions for breaks all over the UK and Europe. To find out more head to Laterooms.com where all of the breaks are available to download, with insights from Lisa about why they are so gourmet!
Other MSN Food celebrity summer recipes
Starter: Eric Lanlard's beetroot and broccoli tart
Main course: Maria Elias' tagliata with green tomatoes, oregano and mustard
Side dish: Jacob Kenedy's stewed borlotti beans with tomato and basil
Salad: Jun Tanaka's charred pepper and tomato salad with grilled ciabatta
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