Heavenly chocolate devil's food cake

Heavenly chocolate devil's food cake

Ingredients

• 75g ( cup) cocoa powder
• 125ml ( cup) boiling water
• 200g butter
• 400g (2 cups) caster sugar
• 10ml (2 tsp) vanilla essence
• 4 extra-large eggs, lightly beaten
• 360g (3 cups) cake flour
• 5ml (1 tsp) bicarbonate of soda
• Pinch of salt
• 250ml (1 cup) buttermilk

Chocolate ganache:

• 500g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
• 375ml (1 cups) fresh cream
• 15ml (1 tbsp) corn syrup/liquid glucose
• Red rose petals, for decoration

Method

Preheat the oven to 180C. Grease or spray 3 x 20cm cake pans (heart-shaped if you have) and line the bases with baking paper. Sift the cocoa into a bowl, add boiling water and whisk to blend well. Set aside to cool.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and caster sugar until light and fluffy. Add the vanilla essence and the cocoa mixture. Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Sift flour, bicarb and salt together and add to the creamed mixture, blending on a low speed. Stir in the buttermilk. Divide the mixture between the pans and bake for 25-35 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool on a rack for 10 minutes.

For the ganache, combine the chocolate and cream in a pan and stir over a very low heat until the chocolate has melted. Remove from the heat and add the corn syrup. Transfer to a metal bowl, stirring occasionally until thickened and cooled. Place one cake on a plate and spread with ganache. Place second cake on top, spread and repeat. Spread remaining ganache down the sides and sprinkle with petals.

Makes 1 large cake