The sun is shining and my thoughts turn to Afternoon Tea in the garden and of course scrumptious cake ! Recently Olly and I popped into The Cake Shed in Tunbridge Wells and are now totally addicted, the sandwiches and range of tea choices are amazing, but what is really to die for is their cake ! The hardest thing to do is to decide which one to have, so Olly and I have decided that many return journeys are required and on each visit a new tea and new slice of cake will be sampled. Its relaxed, friendly and the staff are all so lovely, I can highly recommend it if you happen to be near The Pantiles and have that over whelming urge for cake.
I recently tried the Chocolate and Strawberry Cake, not normally a combination that I would go for, but it was so pretty that I was drawn to it, one bite and I was hooked, the frosting is so fresh tasting and compliments the rich chocolate sponge so well. I just knew that I had to recreate this at home for my friend Fiona.
So I took my tried and tested chocolate fudge cake recipe for the sponge as I wanted a rich moist cake and this one is so simple to make and then scoured the internet for what I hoped would be a similar strawberry frosting and BOOM, hit the nail on the head first time.
I must admit you may find it a bit of a pain taking so many gorgeous fresh strawberries to turn into a concentrate, especially as we are only just entering into the strawberry season (the recipe did say you could use jam, I would highly recommend a good quality one if deciding on taking this route), but I must warn here that it is well worth the extra effort as I just do not think that you will achieve the same fresh and clean tasting frosting, but hey, I may be wrong and if so, please let me know your thoughts if you do try jam.
Well said cake was tried and tested over coffee with the lovely Fiona this morning and OMG it was truly to die for and well worth telling you all about, now all I need to do is to get The Cake Shed to let me in on their secret to how they get such a fantastic drizzle on their lemon cake and I am winning, LOL 😉
Buon appetito
Note : I decorated the top of the cake with dried rose petals.
100g spreadable butter, plus extra for greasing
250ml milk
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
100g plain chocolate, melted
15g cocoa powder, sifted (I always use Green & Blacks)
300g self-raising flour, sifted
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda, sifted
225g golden caster sugar
2 eggs
Preheat the oven to 190c, fan 160c, gas 4.
Grease a 20cm round, deep cake tin and line with baking paper.
Mix the milk and vinegar together.
Place all the other ingredients in a large mixing bowl (thank god for my Artisan). Pour in the milk mixture and beat with an electric mixer or hand whisk until smooth. I tend to beat the ingredients in the bowl together for a couple of seconds first and then dribble in the milk mixture slowly, but its up to you, both ways work equally as well. Once smooth spread into the cake tin and bake for 1 hour, until firm in the centre.
Cool for 10 minutes, then turn onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Halve the cake through the middle.
For the Frosting:
Strawberry Concentrate (Make a day in advance):
450g /1 lb. fresh strawberries, sliced or roughly chopped
1/2 cup sugar
Make the Frosting Base:
1 1/2 cup butter
3-5 cups icing sugar
1 vanilla bean
1 tsp vanilla extract
Strawberry Concentrate:
Toss strawberries and sugar in a small saucepan and bring to a boil.
Turn down to simmer and continue to cook for 1 1/2-2 hours or until strawberries have reduced by 2/3rds and are extremely thick, like jam.
Now comes the tricky part. I’m pretty particular, so I strained mine through a very fine sieve to get out all those seeds. I think you could get away with not doing this step, but I thought it would make the overall texture a lot better.
Pour into a small bowl and lay plastic over the surface to avoid a skin. Allow to chill for at least four hours.
For the Frosting Base:
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter until fluffy (about 5 minutes).
Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean pod and add to the butter along with the vanilla extract.
Slowly add in the icing sugar one cup at a time on slow speed. Scrape down sides of bowl between additions.
If making in advance, keep frosting in the fridge. Bring it back to room temperature when you are ready to assemble your cake. Beat the room temperature frosting until it becomes fluffy again.
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