Do you love cake? Then I URGE you to stop whatever you're doing and make this cake.
The photo isn't the best - harsh work lighting - but hopefully you can get a sense of what a mighty cake this is. It's
Nigel Slater's chocolate beetroot cake, taken from his beautiful book
Tender (vol 1). It's quite an involved cake to make - pureed beetroot, melted chocolate, whisked egg whites - but the results are absolutely worth it.
Nigel was right (I can't believe I doubted him) - it's probably the world's best chocolate cake, full of dark, rich, complex flavours. He tops it with creme fraiche and poppy seeds, but because I was making it for our
Bake Club I knew I needed to add a little more wow factor. I topped mine with
caramel cream cheese frosting, then scattered over some shards of 72 per cent chocolate and some candied purple carrot. I used this recipe for
candied carrot curls as a guide, but on my first attempt I ended up with a smoke-filled kitchen and a tray of burnt carrot strips. I'd recommend cooking the carrot in the syrup for a shorter time period and lowering the oven temperature.
The judges loved it enough - I knocked out the competition easily. Most importantly, I got to savour the very last piece. I might not ever experience it again, but I've finally tasted success.
beautiful... beautiful blog post and a beautiful cake!
ReplyDeleteYay. I am so happy for you and admire your Wow additions, esp. the candied purple carrot even though it may not have worked well this time round. You may be interested to note that I make a vegan Chocolate and Beetroot Cake and came runner up last year in the Great Vegan Bake Off 2013
ReplyDeletehttp://allotment2kitchen.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/vegan-beetroot-chocolate-cake-with.html Like yours it needed more wow, so as well as the vegan beetroot butter cream filling i made some beetroot dust, it was pretty awesome. I have to say though I am also v. tempted by Mr Slaters version, still got to get my mitts on Tender. Once again well done on knocking the competition out.
Just saw this cake and it looks beautiful - and makes me a little sad because I ordered chocolate beetroot cake at a restaurant tonight and it was past its best and I wish I had been served a piece of your amazing cake instead! Yay for wowing the judges
ReplyDeleteThat caramel cream cheese frosting is the greatest thing to ever happen to my baking repertoire. And the cake looks amazing. I'm learning never to doubt NS either x
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