A little taster of what's cooking...
If ever there was a good time to make a truly indulgent cake, it’s at Easter. Alternatively, you could always make it after Easter to use up the Easter eggs!
The cake itself is just a chocolate Victoria sandwich and you don’t have to use Maltesers for the top, you can pile it high with your favourites.
I always start a cake by weighing the eggs. Use 3 or 4 eggs, depending on how deep you’d like your chocolate sponge to be. Once you’ve weighed the eggs, write down the weight and make sure that you use the same for: butter, sugar and self raising flour (plus 1/2 tsp baking powder). When it comes to adding the cocoa powder (not drinking chocolate) I prefer to dissolve a couple of tablespoons with a tablespoon or so of boiling water – stir to make a paste (use a splash more water if you need it). Add this after you’ve creamed the butter and sugar together and then mix well before the next step. When the mixture has been made, it should drop from a spoon with some gentle encouragement. If it doesn’t, just add a splash of milk. Bake in two lined Victoria Sandwich tins.
You’ll need 125g of Milky Bar but don’t eat the rest, you’ll need to melt it to put on top of the finished cake! You’ll also need a small bar of your favourite milk chocolate for decorating the top, too.
For the icing, you’ll need:
175g butter, 175g icing sugar, 125g Milky Bar, 1tsp vanilla (optional)
Melt the Milky Bar and leave to cool. Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the cooled chocolate and beat again until really light.
Sandwich the cake together with a layer of Nutella (or similar) and using a piping bag (optional) pipe half of the icing over the nutella layer before putting the other layer of cake on the top.
Spread the rest of the icing on to the top of the cake and gently press the Maltesers into the soft icing – don’t push them too far in, it’s just to make sure that they don’t roll off. Cut some of them in half to drop into any gaps and give a different texture. Drizzle over the leftover melted Milky Bar and some melted milk chocolate. Sprinkle over some edible glitter or sprinkles (optional)