Phil has kindly shared a family recipe with us and it is such a versatile one.  Here is what he has to say about it.

“This recipe is for a basic one bowl cake which as you will see can then be modified into different forms. Feel free to experiment – for example, leave out the cocoa and you have a plain cake. Most importantly, have fun and enjoy!!!”

Aunty Pat’s Chocolate Cake

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 1/2 cups SR flour
• Pinch of salt
• 2 tbsp cocoa
• 1 tsp bi-carb soda
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 125 g butter
• 2 eggs (at room temperature and then lightly beaten with a fork
• 1 tsp vanilla essence or 1/2 tsp vanilla paste

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180 C ie. A moderate oven
2. Line a deep baking tin (square = approx. 20 X 20cm) or                   round = approx. 25cm diameter) with baking paper.
3. Melt butter and stand aside to cool, then add milk and vanilla.
4. Sift SR flour, bi-carb soda, salt and cocoa into a large bowl.
5. Add the brown sugar and mix the dry ingredients together.
6. Add the butter / milk / vanilla mixture and the eggs to the bowl.
7. Gently stir with a wooden spoon until contents are relatively smooth – do not over mix.
8. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and cook for about 40 to 45 minutes, until the top is firm and an inserted skewer comes out clean.
9. Leave the cake to cool in the tin for 5 minutes and then turn out on to a wire rack. Decorate as required. This cake goes down extremely well with a large glass of ice cold milk!

To give this a Jaffa flavour

Add 2 teaspoons of finely grated orange zest and the juice from one orange to the cake mixture and stir in.

Chocolate Icing

• Minimum 100g dark chocolate
• 50g unsalted butter at room temperature
• Dash of thickened cream

1. Melt chocolate and butter in a small bowl.
2. Cool and add the cream
3. Stir until thick and spreadable

Turn this into a Chocolate Pudding

• 3/4 cup of brown sugar
• Heaped tbsp. cocoa
• 1 cup boiling water

1. Pour Aunty Pat’s Chocolate Cake mixture (as above) into a pudding bowl.
2. Combine the brown sugar with the cocoa and sprinkle this evenly over the top of the mixture.
3. Carefully pour the boiling water onto a tablespoon held over the pudding so that it will gently overflow onto the mixture.
4. Place the pudding bowl into the centre of a moderate oven (180 C) and cook for 40+ minutes, until the top is firm and the pudding is coming away from the sides.
5. Serve immediately with thick cream and / or good quality vanilla ice cream.

Here comes the best part (and you have a head start!)

Rich Fudge Cake

• Aunty Pat’s Chocolate Cake Mixture (as above)
• 150g dark chocolate (preferable at least 70% cocoa) melted and cooled.
• ½ cup (125g) sour cream at room temperature.

1. Add the cooled melted dark chocolate and sour cream to the cake mixture and beat with an electric mixer on low speed until just combined.
2. Then beat on medium speed for 2 minutes until the cake mixture has turned a lighter colour.
3. Pour the cake mixture into the prepared pan (recommended sizes as above) and cook in a moderate oven for about 60 minutes – until the top is firm and an inserted skewer comes out clean.
4. Stand cake in pan for 10 minutes and turn onto a wire rack to cool.
5. If decorating, level the top of the cake with a large bread knife and then decorate as desired.

Featured Image with thanks to Leon Brooks