Chocolate Fudge Cake

My daughter decided she wanted to bake her own chocolate cake for her birthday - she wanted a simple plain chocolate cake and I was like, no, we need decorations, it cannot be plain for a birthday.  So we compromised and used some flowers, leaves and berries along with some icing sugar - and it does look spectacular!

This cake is not sweet - so I loved it - it is moist and pairs beautifully with ice cream.  We had the cake warm with a scoop of ice cream.

Ingredients:

1 ¾ cups plain flour

1 ½ teaspoons baking soda

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

2 cups caster sugar

2 large eggs

100 grams butter, melted

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup cocoa powder

1 cup hot water

For the Ganache: 

170 grams semi-sweet chocolate

¾ cup thickened cream

1- 9 inch x 4 inch x  21/4 inch loaf pan (inside measurements) - greased and papered with some overhang

Method:

Turn the oven on to 180 deg C without fan.

Sieve together flour, baking powder and baking soda and put in a mixing bowl.  Add the sugar and salt and mix well. Make a well in the centre and add the two eggs and melted butter.  Mix well till smooth.  Add the vanilla extract and mix again.

To one cup of cocoa powder add 1 cup hot water and whisk well.  Pout this mixture to the cake batter slowly mixing as you go.  You will get a smooth runny batter.

Pour into your loaf tin and bake for 35 to 45 minutes.  We got a little extra batter that we put in to a couple of muffin moulds.

While the cake is baking, make your icing.

In a microwave safe cup, add the chocolate and cream and heat in bursts of 10 seconds - till the chocolate melts. Whisk till you get a smooth pouring chocolate ganache.

When the cake is out of the oven, pour the ganache and smooth it down.  Let the cake be in the fridge for at least 2 hours.  We left it overnight.

Using the greased paper overhang, gently pull the cake out on to a serving platter. Decorate and serve.

We warmed the slices for 20 seconds and served it with ice cream.