Chocolate Brownie Cake

Seems I've been cooking up a storm in the kitchen recently.  And it's none of that fancy, test my skills to the limit stuff that I promised myself I was going to start investing some time in.  Oh no ... looks like my dreams of becoming a world renowned Michelin star pastry chef will need to wait a wee while longer!  Instead I've been baking 'homey' stuff.  The kind of food you feed to family and friends, that not only tastes great and fills your belly put also puts a smile on your face.  That said, I can think of no better place to begin updating my recent kitchen exploits than with this cake.

Chocolate Brownie Cake

175g unsalted butter, plus extra for greasing

225g dark chocolate, broken into pieces

200g caster sugar

3 eggs, separated

75g plain flour

50g chopped pecan nuts

Icing sugar, to serve

Heat the oven to 180C/fan 160C.  Butter a 20-25cm cake tin and line with greasproof paper.  Place 175g of the chocolate, plus the butter and sugar in a heavy based pan and heat gently until melted, stirring occasionally.  Leave to cool.

Whisk yolks into the chocolate mix, then add flour, nuts and rest of chocolate.  Whisk egg whites to form soft peaks, then gently, but thoroughly, fold into the mix.

Pour into tin and bake in the centre of the oven for 35-40 mins until crusty on top.  Leave to cool, then run a knife around the sides; remove.  Dust with icing sugar, serve warm with custard or cold with cream.

Serves 10

Good Food, April 11

If I had to criticise, and its picking at straws to do so, it's that this cake doesn't keep that well.  In fairness, it would have been a better idea to bake this cake when there were more than 3 people at the dinner table, but when the notion takes you to bake a Chocolate Brownie Cake ... well, you've just gotta go with it!  This also meant that when the recipe called for pecans and I didn't have any, that I had to sub with the only thing I did have, which was slivered almonds.  This lent a very grown up and, dare I say, sophisticated feel to an otherwise homespun kind of a cake.  We discovered it is best served with strawberries (for a balanced diet) and clotted cream ;0)