A moist, airy and rich chocolate layer cake, the Devil’s food cake is the quintessential chocolate cake. As Nigella says, “Goo here is good”! And how!
Ingredients
50g best-quality cocoa powder, sifted
100g dark muscovado sugar
250ml boiling water
125g soft unsalted butter, plus some for greasing
150g caster sugar
225g plain flour
1⁄2 teaspoon baking powder
1⁄2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
For the frosting
125ml water
30g dark muscovado sugar
175g unsalted butter cubed
300g best-quality dark chocolate finely chopped
2 x 20cm sandwich tins
Put the water, muscovado sugar and butter in a pan over a low heat to melt. When this mixture begins to bubble, take the pan off the heat and add the chopped chocolate, swirling the pan so that all the chocolate is hit with heat. Leave for a minute before whisking this mixture till smooth. Leave this mixture for about 1 hour, whisking in between.
How To
Preheat the oven to 180°C. Line the bottoms of both sandwich tins with butter paper and butter the sides.
Put the cocoa and dark muscovado sugar into a bowl and pour in the boiling water. Whisk and set aside.
Stir the flour, baking powder and bicarb together in another bowl and set aside.
Beat the butter and caster sugar in another bowl until pale and fluffy. Add vanilla extract to this and mix. Add 1 egg, followed by a scoopful of the flour mixture and mix well. Add the second egg and the rest of the flour and mix well. Lastly, fold in the cocoa mixture.
Divide this batter between the 2 tins and put in the oven for about 30 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Once the cakes are done, allow to cool on a wire rack for 5–10 minutes.
Set one of the cooled cakes with its top side down on a cake stand and spread about a third of the frosting on top. Top this with the second cake and spread the remaining frosting over the top and sides.
Source: www.nigella.com
Notes: I used dark brown sugar instead of muscovado sugar. The picture I have attached for this recipe is not that of the very first Devil’s Food Cake I made. This one was baked on order, hence the professional finish!
Devil’s Food Cake
