Mud Cake

(Adapted Donna Hay's 50th birthday magazine.)

• 200 g butter, chopped
• 200 g dark chocolate, chopped (I combined Lindt Excellence 50 % Cocoa Dark chocolate and Lindt Excellence Extra creamy milk )
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 30ml cup water
• 115 g self-raising (self-rising) flour, sifted
• 25 g Dutch Processed cocoa
• 3 eggs
• 220 g Brown sugar

1. Preheat oven to 160° C (325° F). Lightly grease round cake tin lined with non-stick baking paper. Set aside.
2. Place the butter, chocolate, vanilla extract and water in a saucepan over low heat and stir until melted. Set aside and allow to cool to room temperature.
3. Using a fine-mesh sieve, sift the flour and cocoa into a small bowl. Repeat an additional 2 times.
4. Place the eggs and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and beat for 6 minutes or until pale and thick. Add the chocolate mixture and beat until combined.
5. Using a large spatula, fold through the flour-cocoa mixture.
6. Pour into the lightly greased baking tin. Bake for 1 hour 30 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer**.
7. Allow to cool in the baking tin for 10 minutes. Turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Donna Hay's tip:
**To test mud cake, insert a skewer into the centre; it will emerge coated in cake. Roll the cake from the skewer on your fingertips, if it balls and feels tacky, it’s time to take the cake out of the oven.”

Chocolate Ganache

I always believe the best chocolates would make a huge difference in the ganache and also in the cake. My preference of chocolate is the Lindt Excellence Bar. Even though Lindt Excellence Bar is not cooking chocolate , you can still use it for baking. I have always used Lindt in my baking.

• 150ml Double cream **
• 150 g chocolates, chopped ( I combined Lindt Excellence 50 % Cocoa Dark chocolate and Lindt Excellence Extra creamy milk)

1. Place the cream and chocolate in a small saucepan over low heat and stir until melted and smooth. Set aside and allow to cool to room temperature.
2. Spread ganache over the cooled cake to serve.

** Instead of using single cream as stated in the orignal recipe, I used double cream. It would give you almost similar taste but With double cream having 48 -60% fat compared to single cream only having 35% fat, The texture would be slight different. With double cream it would hold its shape better but with single cream in hot and humid climate like Malaysia, the texture would be a little runny.