Chocolate and Coffee Cake

We're bringing your taste buds back to basics with the taste chocolate combined with coffee. There's nothing better than a rich chocolate sensation in your mouth exquisitely combined with coffee to make your day even more special. This recipe is surprisingly easy to make even though there is quite of a lot ingredients. But don't worry all ingredients for my recipes are affordable so I'm not asking you to break the bank. You only need 100g of dark chocolate for the pure richness of the chocolate and instant coffee to get the taste melting in your mouth. The best part is you can use different coffee flavours if you love a particular kind of coffee such as cappuccino, latte and espresso. So there's no need to buy fresh organic coffee beans $14/£12 for 250g. So why not give this recipe try? You will be delighted to treat yourself at the end of the working day with chocolate and coffee creamed with delicious frosting.

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Preparation: 30 minutes

Time in the Oven: 15-20 minutes

Icing preparation: 10 minutes

Frosting and decorating: 50-60 minutes

Total Time: 2hrs+

Ingredients

For the Sponge

• 180g of butter
• 1 1/2 cup of light brown sugar
• 3 eggs
• 100g of dark chocolate (melted)
• 2 cups of plain flour
• 225g of sour cream
• 2tbsp of instant coffee
• 1tsp of salt
• 1 1/2 of baking powder
• For the frosting
• 200g of butter (soft)
• 650-700g of icing sugar
• 200g of cream cheese
• 1 lemon juice

For Decoration

• Rosemary or lavender plant
• Chocolate cookie crumbs
• Equipment
• Three 20-25cm sandwich tins
• 25-30cm cake board
• Baking paper
• Palette knife
• Cake side scraper

The Sponge

1. Line the baking paper with the sandwich cake tins and the grease the sides of the tins with a thin coat of butter
2. In a medium sized bowl begin to cream the butter and sugar together until well combined then place the eggs in one at a time in with the mixture.
3. Melt the dark chocolate either in a microwave safe bowl or on plate over a simmering pan of water. Once the dark chocolate has melted, pour into the mixture and continue to whisk on a medium speed in mixer or hand held whisk ensuring that all sides of the bowl are scarped down. Add the flour, baking powder and salt to the mixture until all ingredients combined. In a separate bowl, mix the sour cream and instant coffee together then incorporate the two into cake batter. Mix well then begin to evenly disperse the cake batter into the three sandwich cake tins. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the middle of each cakes are fully baked by using a toothpick or skewer.
4. Leave the cakes to cool once there out of the oven and begin to make the frosting

For the Frosting

1. Cream 1/3 of the butter with 1/4 of the icing sugar until the frosting begins to form. Next add 1/3 of the cream cheese to the frosting with 1/2 the juice of the lemon.
2. Repeat this step with the remainder of the butter, icing sugar, lemon juice and cream cheese until the icing is thick and smooth. If the frosting is not thick enough just add some more icing sugar.

Assembling and decorating

1. Spread a small amount of the frosting in the middle the cake board then place the first cake layer onto the cake board (this is to prevent the cake from moving whilst decorating). Evenly coat the top of the cake layer with icing then place the second layer on top. Repeat this step for this step for the final cake layer.
2. Once your layers are sandwiched together, spread a thin layer of frosting all around the cake using the palette knife. This first coat of frosting is called the crumb coat so all the crumbs of the cake will be strained to this layer. Place the cake in the fridge once fully covered with frosting for 30 minutes so the crumb coat layer can set.
3. After 30 minutes, take out the cake from the fridge and begin to layer the second coat of frosting using the palette knife. Once the cake is fully covered, smooth down the sides and top of the cake with the cake smoother. Finally sprinkle the chocolate cookie crumbs around the edges of the cake and finish the cake with lavender or rosemary plant at the top.