Thursday 7 October 2010

Chocolate & Date Sandwich Cake

Being on Maternity Leave means I have time to catch up with friends for lunch.  You would think I should have all the time in the world - somehow time flies even quicker with demands of a baby to pander to.  Anyhow, I love to bake, have done since I was little.  So, with the offer of lunch at a work colleague's house, what better excuse to put the pinny on and whip up a cake?

Woah!  Oozy cream and chocolate spread escaping!


This cake is from: 200 cakes and bakes ~ Hamlyn all colour cookbook

Chocolate & Date Sandwich Cake

This is what the hubbs left but subsequently ate for lunch!
150 g (5 oz) ready-chopped dried dates
150 ml (1/4 pint) boiling water plus 6 tablespoons
50 g (2 oz) cocoa powder
150 ml (1/4 pint) sunflower oil
3 eggs
175 g (6 oz) caster sugar
175 g (6 oz) self-raising flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

150 ml (1/4 pint) double cream
150 g (5 oz) fromage frais
3 tablespoons chocolate spread
5 bought chocolate truffles, halved


 Simmer dates in a saucepan with the 150 ml (1/4 pint) boiling water, covered, for 5 minutes until softened.  Gradually mix the cocoa powder with the remaining 6 tablespoons boiling water until smooth.  Leave the dates and dissolved cocoa powder to cool.

Add the oil, eggs and sugar to the dissolved cocoa powder then whisk together until smooth.  Add the flour and baking powder then whisk again.  Stir in the cooled dates and any cooking liquid and mix well.

Divide the mixture evenly between 2 x 20 cm (8 inch) sandwich tins, greased and base-lined with oiled greaseproof paper and spread the surfaces level.  Bake in a preheated oven, 180 C (350 F), Gas Mark 4, for 20 minutes until well risen and the cakes spring back when gently pressed with a fingertip.

Leave to cool in the tins for 5 minutes the loosen the edges, turn out on to a wire rack and peel off the lining paper.  Leave to cool completely.

Whip the cream until softly peaking then fold in the fromage frais.  Put one cake on to a serving plate, spoon over chocolate spread then half the cream.  Top with the second cake and spread with the remaining cream.  Decorate with the halved chocolate truffles.



I used 7 inch shallow sandwich tins so managed to bake three cakes.  Two of which were used to make the cake and the other just cut in half and sandwiched with chocolate spread and cream to make a half moon shaped cake.  This was for my hubbs.  He likes cake and especially chocolate ones!  I had some home-made choc & mint truffles in the freezer that I got for my birthday so these were defrosted and used for the cake.



Sorry about the disposable plate - it was for transportation to friend's house!

5 comments:

  1. This looks very good! There is no butter in there, so it must be healthier, hahah. I love chocolate cakes and I have a habit of collecting chocolate cake recipes, so I will bookmark this :)

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  2. Ah....I think the best chocolate cake recipe I've tried has to be a chocolate chiffon I found on Corner Cafe. It's light and very very deep chocolatey! Ah...you'll need your electric whisk for that one! :0(

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  3. I will be back to baking cakes and breads pretty soon. Just bought a hand-held cake-mixer again (same model from Philips, it seems I dun learn from mistakes) and a breadmachine from ALDI. I saw the kenwood standmixer, one of the models costs 250 euro, 3 times the total price of my little mixer + breadmachine combined. There is another kenwood model which I can only admire from far, it costs 450 euro! And my bread machine is only 40 euro from ALDI supermart, funny it costs the same price as my hand-held mixer :)

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  4. This cake looks rich and chocolatey !! Salivating now..wish we are neighbors :)

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  5. Elin: that'd be great! A weekly excuse to bake cake!

    Miss B: YipEEeeeeeEEe! Had your hand-mixer run out of warranty? Just don't use it for 30 minute kneading! I can see why you got the bread-machine to do the kneading.
    Yup, I think hubbs spent around £170-190 on the Kenwood - It had a discount at Costco. Lucky me to get it eh? When reading the brochure on attachments, I was longing for the Titanium model, but that is dbl price at £360! OUCH! Kitchen Aid is around £340. I will make do with what I am lucky to have!

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