This cake is an adaption of two recipes: Fijian chocolate cake by Alexa
Johnston from foodie.co.nz (http://foodie.co.nz/Recipes/Fijian-Chocolate-Cake-by-Alexa-Johnston.aspx) with a Black Forest-type filling. Alexa
calls in Fijian because it uses coconut cream. It makes a really dark, moist
chocolate cake. I made 1 ½ times this recipe to make a big cake to feed 10
adults.
210 g flour
55 g cocoa
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
200 g sugar
2 eggs
125 g melted butter
400 ml tin coconut cream
1 tsp vanilla essence
See Alexa’s recipe for her coconut icing ingreds and method. For my filling I
used:
2 cans of pitted cherries
500 g whipped cream
dark chocolate shavings
Preheat the oven to 350º F/180º C. Grease an 8 in/20 cm round tin and line the
bse with a circle of baking paper. Bring the eggs to room temperature.
Sift the dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl and add the sugar.
Beat the eggs lightly, add the melted butter, coconut cream and vanilla and
pour this onto the dry ingredients.
Beat with a wooden spoon for about a minute until smooth and well combined,
pour into the tin and bake for 45 – 55 minutes.
The cake should be well risen and will spring back when you press the centre
gently with your finger. (Because I made a bigger cake I baked it for nearly one hour.
After 40 mins I put foil on top to stop the top getting burned.) Remove from
the oven and cool for 5 minutes before turning out onto a rack to cool. When
cool cut the cake into 3 layers. Drain the cherries, saving the syrup. Heat the
syrup with a bit of kirsch or nice liqueur that would go well with the
cherries. Pour onto the layers. (This time I didn’t use liqueur as kids were
eating the cake.)
Mix the cherries with half of the whipped cream. Spread half onto the bottom
cake round, put middle layer on top, then spread the rest of the cherry mixture
on the middle layer and place the top cake layer.
Cover top with cream and decorate with chocolate
shavings. Serve with cream.
This is my entry into February’s Sweet New
Zealand, hosted by Sugar and Spice and All Things Nice (http://sugarandspice-and-allthingsnice.blogspot.co.nz). Her link to February's entries: http://sugarandspice-and-allthingsnice.blogspot.co.nz/p/sweet-new-zealand.html