The Cake is NOT a Lie

Recently it was a friend's 21st birthday. She's into her gaming and I'm not so it took a bit of searching online before I found the perfect cake; the portal cake! Apparently this is a famous cake from the game Portal which is promised as a reward but never delivered, hence "the cake is a lie".

What I was aiming for.

Nailed it!

I didn't realise until afterwards that actually it was supposed to be a black forest gateaux and instead made a chocolate cake - luckily this worked to my favour as she doesn't like black forest gateaux!

This is a super easy cake based on a well tried and tested recipe. I'd certainly recommend giving it a go!

For the cake:

• 4 tablespoons of cocoa powder
• 2 tablespoons of boiling water
• 8oz/225g self raising flour
• 8oz/225g stork or butter
• 8oz/225g caster sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder

For the icing:

• 4oz/100g plain chocolate
• 16oz/450g icing sugar, sifted
• 7oz/200g butter, softened
• 2oz/50g cocoa powder, sifted
• a little water or milk

For the decoration:

• 1 small tub extra thick cream
• 75g/3oz plain chocolate
• 75g/3oz milk chocolate
• 8 strawberry gobstobbers (or 8 cherries - your choice)

1. Preheat oven to 180c. Mix the cocoa powder and hot water together in a small bowl until a paste is formed.
2. Place the remaining cake ingredients into a large bowl or your kitchen aid bowl and mix together until all combined. Add in the cocoa paste and mix until the batter is evenly brown.
3. Grease three cake tins, line with a circle of greaseproof paper and grease again. Split the batter between the tins and cook for 25 minutes.
4. Once a toothpick comes back clean when pushed into the cake and it springs back when touched, remove the cakes from the oven and cool completely on a wire rack.
5. To make the icing melt the chocolate in a microwave on 30 second bursts until melted. Leave to cool for 5 minutes.
6. Sift the icing sugar and cocoa powder in a bowl, cream with the butter using the back of a spoon - watch out as icing sugar will often get everywhere!
7. Once a thick butter icing is made add in the melted chocolate and mix until thoroughly combined. Use a little water or milk to loosen the mix until it is at a consistency that can be easily spread.
8. Spread about a quarter of the icing onto the first bit of cake, place another cake on top, repeat with the icing. Retain 1/4 of the icing spread the remaining down the sides of the cake. This is creating a "crumb coat" that traps any crumbs from showing in your final icing (it doesn't actually matter too much for this cake). Pop your cake in the fridge for 10 minutes.
9. Meanwhile grate your two chocolate bars. Try and keep it as cool as possible so you don't end up with it melted. Also fill your extra thick double cream into an icing bag and pipe 8 dollops onto a piece of greaseproof paper, dab them down with your finger to form circles.
10. Remove your cake from the fridge and apply your final layer of icing, press the chocolate flakes onto the cake and finally use a spatula to evenly space the 8 circles of cream around the cake. Top each circle with a gobstopper.

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Stir up Sunday

This year I'm making gifts for some of our family. This isn't necessarily a cost-saving move, in fact the ingredients for a Christmas cake really mount up - especially with all the alcohol involved! Instead it is more to provide something that can be consumed and won't lie around collecting clutter or being donated to a local charity shop in the new year. I hope they appreciate all the effort that has gone into creating the goodies I've got planned.

So, I thought I'd start with a Christmas cake. There is no more traditional time to make it then Sunday 23rd November; Stir up Sunday. This is the final Sunday before advent and traditionally the day that Christmas puddings would be made and stirred by all the family, making wishes as you went round.

As this is my first year attempting my own Christmas cake I scoured the internet for a simple but tasty recipe and found James Martin's Make & Mature Cake. It appealed to me as it was a simple case of buying a bag of mixed fruit (picked up on offer for £2 for a kg in Waitrose) instead of chopping lots of little pieces, maybe I'll do that next year when I'm a bit more experienced in the world of fruit cakes!

I actually doubled the mix and made 4 7" cakes. They aren't massively tall but think they'll look great in a few weeks time once iced, for now though they are staying naked so I can continue to feed them. I made these in two batches as I only had two tins and there was no way I had a pan large enough for 2kg of fruit at once.

Ingredients (for four cakes):

• 2kg mixed food
• zest and juice of 2 lemons
• zest and juice of 2 oranges
• 300ml sherry + extra for feeding (my alcohol of choice as it's not as potent as whiskey)
• 500g butter, softened
• 400g light brown sugar
• 350g plain flour
• 200g ground almonds
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp mixed spice
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp cloves
• 100g flaked almonds (didn't double this)
• 8 large eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

1. Place your fruit, lemon orange, sherry, butter and brown sugar in a large pan. Bring it to the boil and then simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to cool for 30 minutes.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
2. Heat your oven to 150c - this is a low, slow cook. Grease your tins, making a large 'collar' from greaseproof paper, line the base too.
3. Once cooled a little add the remaining ingredients and stir thoroughly until all combined, make a wish too.
   
4. Divide the mix between the tins and place in the oven for 2 hours. I didn't find the time decreased for cooking, I suspect the original recipe required longer than 2 hours.
   
5. Remove from the oven and skewer all over, spoon over a tablespoon of sherry. Leave to cool completely in the tin before removing all paper and wrapping in cling film.
   
6. Repeat for the next two cakes!

I'll keep you updated on the feeding and icing process. Wish me luck!

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