Tried and Tested

Ah, yes.

I’m happy to report that I was successful in baking the cake aforementioned in my recent entry and the result was as in the pic, right.

For those of you who would like to try this cake – yes, I have been assured and reassured by the internet and a reader of my blog that the ingredient named ‘instant chocolate pudding mix’ is indeed the one that I thought it was and the product can easily be found in any of the large supermarkets.

If you’re concerned that the cake looks a little small and thin in the picture, rest assured, it’s size should be fine if you use a 10 inch bundt pan as suggested in the recipe. As you can see from the pic, left, my bundt pan is a classic affair, something that may look nice as a decorative item in one’s kitchen (perhaps a kitchen with a large hearth where one can roast a deer and armoured knights are awaiting for their meal) but it is a shallow mould, really more suitable for a fruit cake or jelly and moreover, it’s 9 inches in diameter only. For reasons unknown even to myself, however, I just had to use it for this cake and baked the rest of the batter (about 1/3 of it left) in a normal, round 9” baking pan.

The texture of the cake was good – soft and very moist and a tad spongy, and it tasted good too. It was recommended in the recipe that the cake be eaten warm (20 secs in the microwave) with some vanila ice-cream but I have to say I somewhat disagree. Vanila is good, but raspberry flavour would be even better!

Be warned however, I did not follow the recipe word by word, so results may vary. First of all, I used a chocolate fudge cake mix instead of the devil’s food cake mix – Asda and Tesco decided they didn’t want to have anything to do with the ‘devil’ (anymore) although I’m quite certain that I have seen the product before on the top shelf in Asda's flour section. Unfortunately, the cake mix I bought was 110g less than what the recipe required but I emptied the packet into my large bowl anyway, and did not add any plain flour or cocoa powder to make up for it. And I used 4 eggs instead of 5, vanila essence instead of almond and a little less than 1 cup of chocolate chips - whatever was in my refrigerator, really! But the result, I think was still good.

So, there is a high probability that I will be making it again for that birthday party. But this time, using 2 round 9” baking tins, a proper chocolate frosting instead of that chocolate sauce I made and definitely, definitely with a little more care. Afterall, I don't want to have to blame my husband again for a spoiled dessert.

As for the presentation of the cake - my son wants a dinosaur cake (again), A T-Rex one this time, he said, so help me God.