Sticky little fingers chocolate bar cake

I think for at least a few years you can happily get away with producing a really good chocolate cake covered in yet more chocolate and maybe some sweets for a birthday party, before the obsession with shop-bought primary coloured superheroes and saccharine pink princesses takes over. The bonus with this cake is that if the children are too over-excited the mums and dads will appreciate a slice, for this is a real old-fashioned chocolate cake, the kind I remember my own mother making for celebrations. Just add candles.

FOR THE CAKE:

INGREDIENTS

200g salted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing

40g cocoa powder

90ml water, boiling

200g caster sugar

2 tablespoons vanilla extract

50g golden syrup

4 large eggs, at room temperature

200g self-raising flour

FOR THE ICING AND DECORATION:

120g salted butter

60ml milk

60g cocoa powder

450g icing sugar

favourite chocolate or sweets

METHOD

Grease and line two 20 cm cake tins and preheat the oven to 180°C. In a large mixing bowl, dissolve the cocoa in the boiling water and whisk until you have a thick, smooth paste. Add all the remaining cake ingredients and beat until thick and creamy, about 4 minutes in a stand mixer, 5–6 with a hand-held electric mixer and 8 minutes with a wooden spoon.

Split the mixture equally between the two tins and bake for 25–30 minutes until a skewer comes out of the centre clean and the edges of the cakes are just starting to shrink away from the sides. Leave to cool on a wire rack for 5 minutes, or, as soon as you can bear to touch them, remove them from the tins. Be careful as they are light and fragile.

To make the icing, melt the butter and milk in a saucepan over a low heat. Sift the cocoa and icing sugar into a bowl and add 1 tablespoon of the dry mixture at a time to the wet mixture, beating well with a wooden spoon after each addition. The icing will be very thick, almost unspreadable so heat gently on the hob until it is runny enough to spread. Use half to top one cake and allow it to solidify a little before adding the second cake. Reheat the remaining icing if it has begun to set and pour it over the top. Decorate with your child’s favourite sweets – my eldest loves chocolate caramel, glacé cherries and strawberries but my youngest is a purist; it’s chocolate buttons all the way.

#normalmum #chocolate #cake #koek