Chocolate Brownie Cake

Here's a ridiculously over the top chocolate brownie cake which I've just made. Instead of a usual chocolate sponge cake recipe, I used a brownie recipe and cooked it in two circle tins, sandwiching the two halves together with some chocolate fudge icing. I sprinkled some chopped up milk chocolate, white chocolate maltesers and cadbury's chomp over the top



Here's a picture of the top. I probably went a bit overboard on the toppings, It would have been nice to have a bit more of the icing showing through underneath.

Here's the recipe for anyone who wants to have a go at making this. Bear in mind that I sort of made it up as I was going along so it's not always too precise.

Ingredients:
brownie/cake mix:
6oz dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids is best, but it doesnt matter too much, just make sure its at least 50%!)
6oz butter (I used salted. If you don't use salted, just add a pinch of salt)
12oz sugar (I used 8oz caster sugar and 4oz icing sugar. I like that particular combo, but it doesn't even make that much difference. Just use whatever you've got)
6oz self raising flour
3 eggs

Chocolate fudge Icing:
about 5 tablespoons of sugar
about 5 tablespoons milk
knob of butter
about 4 tablespoons cocoa powder
(Sorry this is so vague. It is one of the areas I made up as I was going along. It's actually a bit of a faff to make this icing anyway, so you could just melt some chocolate and use that)

Topping:
chopped milk chocolat
chopped white chocolate maltesers
chopped cadbury's chomp
(Use anything you want for this. Marshmallows would be nice, or nuts. Not everyone likes nuts though)

Method:
Pre heat the oven to gas mark 5/190C

Break up the dark chocolate and cut the butter into cubes. Put both into a microwaveable mixing bowl and melt in the microwave (you can melt these over a double boiler/bain marie type thing if you dont have a microwave, or if you enjoy wasting time)

Once they're melted, stir in the sugar. I like to add the sugar first as some part of my brain has the idea that this makes the mixture more fudgey. Dunno if that's true or not. Anyway, next you want to add the flour, and break the eggs in on top of that. Stir the whole thing for a while, it should become more gooey and start coming away from the sides a bit. You know how when you make a sponge cake you have to fold everything gently so that the air stays in and it ends up being light? well, for this cake we want the opposite of light, we want it to be dense and fudgey, (and when you eat a slice you instantly gain 10lbs) so don't worry about stiring it lightly and carefully, you can mix it as vigourously as you like.

Prepare the tins. I used two round cake tins, about 9ins wide and 2ins deep. It's best to use some kind of greaseproof paper. Cut a couple of rounds out and press them into the tins, then grease them lightly with some butter.

Pour the mixture into the tins and bake in the preheated oven for approx 20 minutes. Check them after 15 minutes, and keep checking til their done. My worst nightmare is a dry cake, so I tend to take them out while they still seem slightly wobbly, usually they firm up while they cool down.

Turn the cakes out onto a wire rack and leave to cool. You can trim round the edges of the cakes with a sharp knife if they are a bit burnt, or if you just want to make it look neater. While the cakes cool down, make the icing.

Put the sugar, butter and milk into a saucepan and bring to the boil. Boil for a couple of minutes (I chopped the toppings while it was boiling) then add the cocoa powder. Mix with an electric mixer (or just whisk by hand if you don't have one) the more you mix this the more chewy and fudgey it will be.

Pour half of the icing onto one of the cake disks, spread it out and then place the second cake disk on top. Pour the other half of the icing on top of this. Spread it to the edges and then sprinkle on the toppings.

The end. I hope you enjoyed this recipe. It's a very rich cake, I think it would be nice with some icecream. It also makes a good birthday cake.