DELECTABLES WITH DAN: HAPPY BIRTHDAY DANNY HOWELL
It's that special time of year again when we celebrate the birth of our meme Lord and saviour, Daniel, "danisnotonfire" "Pork Chop" Howell. This year, I'm celebrating with a dark chocolate sea-salt cake with a Ribena icing centre and a black as his wardrobe mirror glaze.
**If you don't have the ingredients to make the cake from scratch, or you find it too difficult a boxed chocolate cake mix will do, just add 1 tsp sea salt (or sea salt flakes)
CAKE TIME
To make the cake from scratch you'll need some of the following:
375g self-rising flour
50g sifted cocoa powder
330g caster shell
4 eggs
375ml cold milk
240g butter
200g dark chocolate
2 tsp vanilla essence
2 tsp sea salt flakes (or 1 tsp sea salt)
Cake Me, Birthday Boy
To make this cake, preheat your oven to 180C (350F) and melt chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl. If you've used a large microwave-safe bowl, simply add remaining ingredients in one at a time, stirring in between adding each thing. Be careful not to over stir.
Once the batter is mixed, pour into two well-greased cake pans and put in to bake for 60 minutes. Make sure that cake is thoroughly baked before removing from oven.
*Allow the cake to fully cool before putting the cake into freeze for the next section of preparation.*
To make the cake from scratch you'll need some of the following:
375g self-rising flour
50g sifted cocoa powder
330g caster shell
4 eggs
375ml cold milk
240g butter
200g dark chocolate
2 tsp vanilla essence
2 tsp sea salt flakes (or 1 tsp sea salt)
Cake Me, Birthday Boy
To make this cake, preheat your oven to 180C (350F) and melt chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl. If you've used a large microwave-safe bowl, simply add remaining ingredients in one at a time, stirring in between adding each thing. Be careful not to over stir.
Once the batter is mixed, pour into two well-greased cake pans and put in to bake for 60 minutes. Make sure that cake is thoroughly baked before removing from oven.
*Allow the cake to fully cool before putting the cake into freeze for the next section of preparation.*
Put the cake in the freezer and allow it to fully freeze before making the glaze. You want the cake to be frozen when you pour the glaze over it. The surface of the cake has to be smooth before you pour the glaze over it or it will not have an even, smooth surface and will leave lumps on the surface of the cake.
To make the Ribena icing: You're going to need 6 tablespoons of Ribena to add to a standard buttercream icing. (You can use a storebought one if you don't want to make one.) I decided to use tablespoons because it was easier to experiment with; You don't want the icing to get too runny, but you want it to have a nice light Ribena flavour. If you find that it's too running, add a bit of icing sugar to the icing and mix well with an electric hand mixer. To get the desired colour add 3-4 drops of purple food colouring and 3-4 drops red icing. It will turn a nice deep barney like purple. It will be a nice contrast when you cut through the finished cake.
To make the Ribena icing: You're going to need 6 tablespoons of Ribena to add to a standard buttercream icing. (You can use a storebought one if you don't want to make one.) I decided to use tablespoons because it was easier to experiment with; You don't want the icing to get too runny, but you want it to have a nice light Ribena flavour. If you find that it's too running, add a bit of icing sugar to the icing and mix well with an electric hand mixer. To get the desired colour add 3-4 drops of purple food colouring and 3-4 drops red icing. It will turn a nice deep barney like purple. It will be a nice contrast when you cut through the finished cake.
(Mirror) Glaze Me, Daddy
To make this morbid, yet oddly sexually attractive mirror glaze, you will need:
220g dark chocolate (if you were doing a mirror glaze adding colour other than black or brown you'd need white chocolate.)
16g gelatine powder
220g dark chocolate (if you were doing a mirror glaze adding colour other than black or brown you'd need white chocolate.)
16g gelatine powder
140g sweetened condensed milk
150g glucose OR corn syrup
150g granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
cold water
black food colouring
Firstly, you need to soak the gelatine in 100ml of cold water. The powder should absorb all of the water. Following this, in a non-stick saucepan mix the syrup, vanilla essence, sugar and 60ml of cold water. If your syrup is overly thick, heat it either in the microwave or in the pan before combining with other ingredients. Bring it to a boil.
Once the mixture has been brought to a boil, add the gelatine and sweetened condensed milk and remove from heat. Make sure that all of the gelatine is absorbed by the mixture. Put your chocolate in a large mixing bowl, break it up first and pour the mixture over the chocolate to milk it. DO NOT VIGOROUSLY WHISK.
Once the mixture has been brought to a boil, add the gelatine and sweetened condensed milk and remove from heat. Make sure that all of the gelatine is absorbed by the mixture. Put your chocolate in a large mixing bowl, break it up first and pour the mixture over the chocolate to milk it. DO NOT VIGOROUSLY WHISK.
Add black food colouring to the glaze. Remove the lumps you may have by straining the mixture through a sieve. The glaze needs to cool before it can be used. Once you've finished making the glaze, remove the cake from the freezer. You're going to need to ice the centre of the cake, just as you would a regular cake.
Oh look at that beautiful black glazing. I almost can't believe how perfect this turned out. Once you have iced the centre of the cake, place the cake on a cooling rack with a pan below to catch the run-off of the glaze. Pour the glaze over the cake in a swirly motion, ensuring that all the sides are covered as well as the surface of the cake. You might need to circle around twice with your glaze. I poured the glaze into a spouted cup before attempting to pour; I had better control over it.
Allow the cake to be fully glazed and allow the glazing to set before you ice the bottom of the cake. While that's setting whip up some deep grey icing to ice around the bottom of the cake. If you're not making it from scratch, simply add a few drops of black food colouring to a store bought icing. For this, we're going to be using a shell tip. Create something cute. It will accent and set off the black glazing of the cake.
I couldn't think of a better way to celebrate his birthday. Ribena, blackness and cake. Three of his favourite things rolled into one. Happy birthday to one of the most sarcastic, dickish, funny and charismatically charming blokes on the face of the Earth. Fuck you until next year, Dannyfire.
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