Spiced Chocolate Cake

A REALLY DENSE delicious chocolate cake that will turn your insides into a high-class confectionery store.

(We did 1/2 of this and it still lasted days)

Melt 250g dark chocolate with 250g butter and 185ml water. Cool. Combine 125ml buttermilk, 2tbsp instant coffee, 2 tbsp oil and 4 eggs. Add in 2 cups flour (plus 2 tsp baking powder), 1/2 cup cocoa powder, 2.5 cups sugar, grated nutmeg (lots) and cinnamon. Mixy mixy. Add the melted chocolate and give a final flourish before baking at 160 for well over an hour.

When it's done, tip it upside down and drizzle over with brandy until it can take no more, then tip it right right way up and give it some more. Cool completely.

Make icing by melting 250g butter with another 250g chocolate, cooling, and slurping over the top.

Boy was this cake good. The pic is of the half-sizer.

Bread dumplings

Light n' fluffy they ain't, but they're pretty tasty with a stew or roast. German stuff.

Soak some chopped-up stale bread with just enough hot milk to get it malleable. Fry up some onions in butter, then blitz them with whatever variety of herb you like (parsley is a favourite). Mix everything together into a sticky dough, adding breadcrumbs or flour to firm up. Shape into hefty dumplings. Boil in salted water until they float.

Gyoza skin

Plain flour and a bit of salt. Add boiling water until you can just form a ball with much kneading. That's pretty much it. Roll out thin, cut out with cookie cutter.

Also much the same for Chinese dumplings (of the skin variety).

Cinnamon Teacake

This originally came in a cake tin but I baked it shallow in a swiss roll tin and cut up into thin half-biscuit half-cake slices. Went down well with a side of cream and served with hot chocolate.

Whisk 130g butter with 2 eggs, 1 cup sugar and plenty of vanilla essence. Stir in 2 cups of self-raising flour (or equivalent) and 2/3 cups of milk, half at a time. Bake at 180. Turn out upside down. Melt butter and brush over the top, sprinkle all over with cinnamon sugar. Cut up into squares.

Apparently they're 'all the taste of a doughnut, in the convenience of a square'.

Potato Parkers

Good for the day after Pasta Night when you have pasta dressing left over. For us it's both meat and veggie - bolognese and tofu-spinach-nut.

Sauce in ramekins at the bottom, parboiled, well-salted slices of potato on top, cheese sprinkled, and baked. Was incredibly well-received and much healthier than loads of sugar and carb.

I guess it's pretty much a dinner dish if larger. One child opined she could 'eat this for breakfast, lunch and dinner'.

Chocolate Swiss Log

Whisk 100g of caster sugar with three whole eggs, until it's all thick and creamy and leaves a trail. Stir in a mix of 75g plain flour and 25g cocoa powder and 15ml hot water, pour into a lined Swiss Roll tin and bake at 180 for about 8-9 minutes until it's pouffy and done. Tip out onto a sugar-sprinkled sheet of baking paper and roll it up while it's hot. Set aside to cool.

The mix I filled it was a cream-cheese and lemon zest, which worked very nicely. Covered it with a simple dark chocolate ganache and all good. Fed 8 as a very light but yummy dessert.