Dark Chocolate Cake with Honey Mascarpone

 

The Recipe

Yields: 20cm cake
Preparation Time: 25 minutes
Baking Time: 35-40 minutes

With a whipped mascarpone and a drizzle of good honey, there is nothing more comforting than this rich chocolate cake.

After writing my article on chocolate, I had a craving for cake - that would be of the chocolate kind. Cake, for me, is as indulgent as it gets and I like to go the whole hog with either a decadent frosting or a drizzle of some kind of delicious sauce with a good scoop of ice cream on the side.

Gluten free, sugar free and less fat - please don't do that to yourselves if you are eating cake. Just don't eat so much of it and it will all balance out. Promise.

Hope you enjoy making and eating this cake as much as my flat mates and I did!

 

INGREDIENTS

Cake
200g unsalted butter
200g caster sugar
180g dark chocolate (60% or above), melted in the microwave or bain marie
3 medium eggs
½ tsp good vanilla extract
3g/ 1½ tsp baking powder
20g/2tblsp cream
50g cocoa powder
¼ tsp fine sea salt
250g plain flour

 

Honey Mascarpone Frosting
250g mascarpone
½ tsp good vanilla extract
20g good strong flavoured honey
50g whipping cream

 

METHOD

  1. Have all ingredients at room temperature

  2. Grease, line and flour a 20cm spring form cake tin

  3. Preheat the oven to 180’C

  4. Cream butter and sugar in an electric mixer until it is pale and light in colour

  5. Mix in slightly whisked eggs and vanilla extract until combined

  6. In a separate bowl, sift cocoa powder, flour, salt and baking powder

  7. Slowly add half the dry mixture and the cream

  8. Finally add the last half of dry mixture, making sure the batter thoroughly mixed, that means not forgetting to scrape the bits of butter and other good stuff that may have stuck to the bottom of the mixing bowl

  9. Pour into the prepared baking tin (the mixture will be thick), level out and place in the oven for 35-45 minutes

  10. The cake is done when inserting a knife it comes out pretty clean. With cooling, the cake will become nice and fudgy so it is important to not over bake!

  11. Let the cake rest for 5 minutes before removing from the cake tin and allowing it to cool completely on a cake rack

  1. Whisk all ingredients until combined and fluffy

  2. Top the completely cooled cake with the mascarpone frosting (as rustic or as neatly as you like) and drizzle with a little more honey

  3. Cut a big slab, curl up on the sofa and indulge in the simple pleasure of this glorious cake!