Chocolate Fudge Cake Take 2

One of the first recipes I ever posted was this chocolate fudge cake, it's deliciously dense and fudgy and I've made it many a time for girls at school and for Josh.

Today is Josh's dad's birthday and after asking what I could do to help with the party, I was given the task of baking the birthday cake.. No pressure.

I waited for what seemed like forever for it to cook. I put it in for 20 mins at 180 celcius, then back in for about another 50 with foil over the top to keep the top nice.

I got a tub of Philadelphia, mixed it with some butter and icing sugar and slathered it on the cake.

Then came to decorating.
I haven't met anyone who doesn't like Mars, so seeing as Josh's cake last year went down so well when I piled it high with Skittles and M&Ms, I thought I'd pile these on.

Mum was kindly given some pots of edible gold by one of her clients at work, which she kindly gave to me.

I used the moisture from the chocolate to stick the gold leaf onto the planets to make it look more jazzy and special.

I'm not meaning to blow my own trumpet, but this is the best chocolate cake I've had, plus the lack of butter in the ingredients means I can swap the milk for coconut or almond milk!

Original recipe with full ingredients and directions here.

The Big 1-8

Yesterday I hit the big 1-8, and after my form's track record of celebrating birthdays, I wasn't sure what to expect.
The night before I had started churning out chocolate chew balls and sausage rolls in their masses ready for my form and my mum even made one of her specialities, brownies, complete with marshmallows and chocolate chips.

WARNING: FOOD PORN!

To start the day off I went out for breakfast to Crabtrees with my mummy and my godmother, Jill.

Crabtrees is the best café near me, their wedges are to die for! Sadly, I didn't get the chance to take a great deal of photos because I was so ravenous and over excited but all three of us went for smoked salmon with poached duck eggs on toast which had definatley been homemade.
It was incredible.
Ever since I can remember I have had an aversion to eggs, I don't mind it when I can't see them like in cakes but not any more!!

Both the meal and the company were the perfect way to start the day but I had bid my farewells and get off to school.

Our class have always organised joint presents, everyone puts in about £10 and gets the birthday girl a joint present, my class gave me such amazing presents, I mean just look at the card!

 

 

 

This is a cookie stamp, so before they jump into the oven I can make sure everyone knows they're homemade!

 

And obviously there were cheese pies...

 

I thought we were ordering pizzas for lunch, and I went to get them with I and M, but instead they drove me to the Suffolk Food Hall where the rest of my class and boyfriend were waiting, I don't think I've ever been so shocked, again I didn't get many photos at all because I was a little bit overwhelmed.

The week before M and I had had a mille-feuille and her lovely mum (who I've never met) made me this beautiful cake, layers of delicious puff pastry, sandwiched with cream and topped with berries and rosemary flowers, then surrounded by beautiful blossoms and sprigs of mint from their garden.

 

Outside the food hall is the most fantastic thing ever. A bouncy pillow.

After gorging ourselves silly we thought it best to work it off!

 

In the evening my boyfriend and mum cooked up a storm with some chicken satay, a delicious Jamie Oliver recipe that I must repost.
I wasn't allowed to do anything but arrange the lettuce, so here's my contribution.

 

Then it was time for cake!
I was literally so full, but you probably know by now that I can always manage some more!

I had the best birthday I've ever had, and today was my last day of school, as a little tribute to my lovely class I thought I'd include a couple of pictures of our day:

Yes, we did spend the day as chillis, there wasn't an actual reason why, and yes, one of our pranks was leaving dead mice we got from a pet food shop around the school, it wasn't my idea!


Daim Bars

Now, I know some of you are going to hate me for this, it being get-ready-for-bikini-season season and everything, but this weekend two members of my form turn the big 1-8 and as you probably will know by now, my form like to celebrate birthdays, for one I'm making my all time favourite chocolate cake and for the other, I'm making my form famous Daim bars upon her request.
If you don't know what they are, here are some pictures, and here's Wikipedia's thoughts on them, but basically they're a bar of buttery caramel blanketed in milk chocolate. And they are divine, just measure the ingredients with your eyes closed in case they discourage you.

8oz butter (it doesn't matter which you use)
10oz caster sugar
1 tbsp. golden syrup
Lots of chocolate (optional)
Maldon sea salt (optional)

This is a quick and easy recipe, a bit like this post, and advance apologies for the photos, butter isn't the most photogenic of ingredients.

Weigh out your butter and sugar, and pop in a medium to large saucepan, get it melted and hot, stirring won't hurt either, just to get it on it's way.

Now, give it time, maybe 5 minutes, it should start bubbling and start to look like this,

It's about ready when it turns a slightly light tan leather colour. I know that's not exactly specialist language but as I was making it, that was the best colour to describe it.
If that didn't help you, grab a mug/cup/glass and fill it with cold water, get a teaspoon of the caramel and drop it into the water, if it goes hard/drops to the bottom, take that pan off!

Get a large baking tray and rip out a sizable sheet of greaseproof paper, pour your caramel onto the tray.

Now, here's where you'll have to use your imagination.
Ideally, you'd pour melted chocolate on top of this and bung it in the fridge for an hour or two to set then beat it with a rolling pin to get rustic shards, it would also work if you scored the caramel a few minutes after pouring onto the tray to get uniform treat sizes, which once covered in chocolate, could have a couple of grains of salt on them to enhance the flavour.
But, if, like me, you have a chocolate snaffling sibling, you will have to buy the chocolate tomorrow.
I will include the chocolate covered bars in any photos of the celebrations, big apologies X

The Cookhouse

It seems that a lot of people around me have birthdays in April, on the last day of term I posted about celebrations for M's, A's and L's birthday, but it actually worked out that L's birthday was the today, the first day back, and so naturally, the celebrations continued in the classroom with the usual cheese pies and chocolate chew balls.

L had found out about her mum's well kept surprise lunch with our form but that didn't mean we couldn't go all out on the tasteful decorations which were not only hung up around the classroom, but also where we were having lunch, The Suffolk Food Hall's Cook House.

The Cook House has amazing views onto the Orwell River, and the Food Hall itself is a working farm, hence the cows in the foreground, or should I say middle ground, seeing as poor B unwittingly jumped in the photo!

H, L's mum had had some Buck's Fizz jazzed up for the ultimate embarrassment/hilarity factor.

Then, the food started arriving,

G, and the majority of the girls, had plumped for the chargrilled rump of beef with onion chutney
and dressed leaves on granary bread.

Another popular dish was B's, the Ploughman’s Platter consisting of honey roast ham, scotch egg, Suffolk Gold, brie, pickles, rocket and a cottage roll.

I had soup of the day, which I didn't get a photo of, but it came with an enormous basket of freshly baked bread which I rapidly devoured.

Next came pudding, only a couple of girls wanted pudding and all but me opted for a chocolate tart topped with caramel ice cream and chocolate sauce,

 but I chose rhubarb parfait accompanied by roasted rhubarb and tuille wafers.

And finally, a surprise for us all, the cake, or cakes, arrived.

My favourite bit are the envious couple in the corner, or maybe the couple who's meal we disturbed by being so excitable.

The most beautifully decorated cupcakes that H had ordered, with the softest and lightest sponge cake and lashings of flavoured buttercream, lemon, mint or strawberry were the ones we came up with.

H insisted that we all take one with our initial on, this proved difficult as there are two Ms, three As and two Ls. So we had to be creative, the birthday girl had the L and I turned my number 1 upside down, who could tell?!

 We all went back to school worn out from laughing and I for one know that I was wishing that I hadn't worn jeans because I ate far too much!
The food hall is absolutely brilliant and I can recommend The Cookhouse for their delicious food and their relaxed atmosphere with beautiful views of the river, not to mention the reasonable prices!