Inspired by Dan’s biscuits and leftover ganache I made these with Ivy – she helped with the mixing and cutting. The chocolate with orange icing biscuit recipe is from my M&S chocolate box book (which they don’t seem to make anymore) but I added some nutmeg for a change. I had some leftover icing from Lawrence’s heart cake so sandwiched them together with the rest of it.

Biscuits:

90g butter softened
60g caster sugar
1 egg
1 tbsp milk
280g plain flour
2 tbsp cocoa powder
ground nutmeg (about a teaspoon)

Blend together the butter and sugar, add the egg then the flour and knead into a dough. Roll out to about 1/4 inch thickness and cut into rounds or stars or whatever you fancy. Place on baking trays lined with greaseproof paper and bake in a 180 over for about 12 minutes. Leave to cool on the trays for a bit before transferring to cooling racks. Allow to cool completely before sandwiching together with the icing. Yum.

I would be posting Tipsy Tart – the alternative to Christmas pudding that I made on Christmas day. It’s a South African recipe and like all their puddings – delicious! In the chaos however I neglected to photograph it so I’ll just have to make it again and post it at a later date.

This therefore is not a very Christmassy recipe but delicious all the same, I always like trying new chocolate cake recipes. It’s from the Chocolate book I’ve used quite a lot now and I made it for my sort-of-sister-in-law’s ‘cake day’ to celebrate the impending birth of Ivy’s cousin.

It’s a melted chocolate recipe, something I seem to have trouble doing lately – I don’t seem to be able to heat it to the right temperature or I keep burning it. Not sure what’s going on, a whole bar of Green & Blacks wasted though, most annoying.

Everybody seems to be making cupcakes at the moment. I baked them for my friend whose birthday it was on Friday and fortuitously she had just received a tiered cake stand from another friend – perfect timing!

I just got this recipe from the internet but used a simple butter icing as I didn’t have enough chocolate to melt. I’d like to make that killer American-style frosting some time, when I have the patience to mess about with separating eggs (not that complicated I know, I was just feeling lazy).

I also used the little silicone cupcake moulds, a present for my birthday. It would be nice idea to bake someone little cakes in them as a complete gift. I’ll have to do that some time.

These were delicious and very moist, I couldn’t resist the Hundreds and Thousands!

I can’t quite believe a year has passed since Ivy entered our lives but at the same time it feels like she’s been here forever. So our special little girl obviously needed a special cake! Oh the pressure, rather than a number One or some silly face I decided an Ivy leaf was appropriate. I made a leaf template on paper (with some tweaking by Lawrence) and cut the cake into shape. I had to add bits to the points of the leaf using the off-cuts, smothering the entire cake with fudge frosting. It was another ‘family chocolate cake’, it’s an excellent cake to shape, easy to cut but extremely moist and chocolaty. Ivy had a little taste of the icing but I’m afraid that’s all she got – how mean! Next year Ivy, I promise.

The icing was an issue, where on earth would I find non toxic green icing? It’s not easy it seems, I couldn’t bring myself to use the ordinary stuff, Dan’s had this issue too. We must be able to find  or perhaps invent some not so lethal alternatives. I had to settle for chocolate icing in the end with some white chocolate drops. It looked a little like a pearly King and Queen cake but I guess that’s quite apt for a first London birthday!

Fudge frosting
90g butter
80ml water
110g caster sugar
240g icing sugar
35g cocoa powder

Combine the butter, water and caster sugar in a saucepan and heat without boiling until the sugar is dissolved. Sift the icing sugar and cocoa into a bowl then gradually add the hot mixture. Cover and refrigerate until the frost thickens. Beat with a spoon until spreadable.
I do think I prefer the simple butter and icing sugar mixture though!

I’ve made this before, more successfully I have to say. Last time I switched the water icing for butter icing and although it’s therefore much fattier (!) I preferred it. It’s another Dan Lepard, using brazil nuts instead of walnuts which are more commonly used in a coffee cake. The special occasion was Lawrence’s dad’s birthday, so many birthdays around this time of year, so many cakes!

For some reason it crumbled more this time and yet retained the moisture – perhaps there was too much air in it. You certainly don’t need your morning coffee – it contains a lot of caffeine! Obviously whilst I’m breast feeding I’m only allowed one slice ;o)