This is the name by which this cake is commonly called - the famous has to taken with a pinch of salt, the kids really think of this as that cake again! But, it still results in someone plaintively complaining that they didn't get even a slice, or that someone else is stealing huge pieces and stuffing them whole into their mouths..inevitably I end up making at least two of these cakes in quick succession - despite the cake being rather a large one anyway.
You can make it in two 20 cm round cake tins, and then layering them for a posh Nigella-like cake, or make 3-4 loaf cakes for lunchboxes, or just make one large 30cm x 40cm cake, I use a roasting tin. The larger the tin, the less likely the cake is to crack along the top.
Oh, and be warned, do not wash the food processor, mine is always appropriated for early cleaning activities such as this. I should probably search my photos over the years to get a complete growth record from babyhood to teenager years and beyond.
But to be fair, this cake is another treasure from my teaching years at Bishop Cottons Bangalore, its proper name is Cocoa Fudge Cake, and thank you again, my very dear teacher colleagues! I would never have learnt to cook without you! And no, none of us were cooking teachers! But I lie, in my years there, we had to take that terrible class called SUPW - and since we were lady teachers in an all boy school, we decided to teach the boys cooking - so there are some very socially useful and productive young men out there, who hopefully remember how to make sandwiches and papdi chaat, even if they remember nothing else.
But back to the cake, this is a wonderful cake for busy people, you throw everything in the food processor and its done...
You need:
2 heaped cups of plain flour (maida)
1 and 1/2 cups sugar (heaped)
2/3 cup best darkest cocoa
1 and 1/2 teaspoon baking soda - NOT baking powder.
1 teaspoon salt
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1 and a half cup buttermilk, or 1 cup yogurt and 1/2 cup water - but buttermilk is best. (A standard 300 ml carton of buttermilk will do for 2 cakes.)
1 cup shortening, or 1 cup olive oil - I always use oil.
2 large eggs or 3 smaller eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
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Steps:
- Line tin or tins with baking paper. Preheat oven to 180 C.
- Measure all the ingredients, and put into the processor.
- Blend for 1/2 a minute at slow speed.
- Blend for 3 minutes at high speed.
- Pour the mixture into the cake tin or tins. Scrape out as much as you can, but leave enough for scavengers.
- Place in preheated oven, and bake for 50 minutes for the large cake, or 30-40 for the smaller. Check with a skewer, if it comes out clean, it's ready.
- Leave for 10 minutes in the pan, before turning out onto a wire rack to cool.
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