♬ 'Number Ones' by Stevie Wonder
After laughing constantly for an hour last night whilst watching Eddie Murphy's 'Raw', I got Stevie on this morning and all of a sudden I wanted to bake, but what? I got it: cola cake with cherries and chocolate! I googled - found and saw it had been done! Classic. Of course someone had already tried this, well this time I was going to add my own spin. This was all thought about while still in bed, before I had even started my abdominal exercises! You can imagine how difficult it was to hold the plank for 1minute 30seconds when all I was thinking about was cherry cola. I collapsed after 1 minute.
I'm not a fan of fizzy drinks, when mixed with a cheeky vodka or rum it's lovely but other than that I'm a pure H20 girl at heart. Cola has a good and bad rep, I've heard it's so acidic it can clean toilets, aeroplane engines and yes make your teeth fall out if you are slightly obsessed with the taste. Once upon a time having Coca Cola at my parents house was a novelty, in fact it was always left over from the night we shared a bucket of KFC. It would sit next to the Ribena and I wasn't even tempted, maybe because when I took one gulp my throat would burn and an immediate ghastly burp would shake the kitchen windows.
A month ago I made a coke marinade for ribs. it was following an America recipe and the results were tantalising! I figured by heating coke it gets concentrated and thicker, and to get this in a cake why not heat it with butter to add thickness?! Also I am a fiend for cherries at the moment and as much as they and any other fruit are better eaten raw, I have added glacé cherries in the cake and topped with organic cherry jam to make myself feel a bit better.
One more thing before I delve into recipe mode, the cake was originally supposed to be two layers sandwiched with jam and topped with chocolate and cherries. Basically the second sponge stuck to the base and my lack of grammar was vocally expressed with the 'F' word a few times. Anyway I worked around the mistake, learnt my lesson on how not to grease a tin and ended up with one sponge.
▶ Recipe for two sponges to make a double cake, or half the ingredients for the one above.
Ingredients:
250g wholemeal self raising flour
200g brown soft sugar
200ml Coca- Cola
125g unsalted butter
Half a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda
1 tablespoon of Nutella
2 medium eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
100g glaced cherries, chopped.
Popping candy
Topping:
Organic cherry jam
200g milk chocolate
Fresh cherries
Method:
: Melt the butter and coke on the hob. Take off the heat and add the bicarbonate of soda. Leave for about 15 minutes.
What this reaction does and why I have added it now and not to the dry mixture:
This chemical reaction forms bubbles of carbon dioxide, which will expand under high temperature. Therefore combined with self raising flour will make the cake have bigger air pockets and rise that bit more.
: Preheat oven to 180°c.
: Grease and line two 20cm sandwich tins.
: Combine flour and sugar in a bowl.
: Add the coke mixture and whisk until smooth, then introduce the eggs one at a time.
: Fold in the Nutella, essence and cherries.
: Pour in each tin and bake for 40 minutes.
: Take out, use a skewer and stab the sponges. Pour one lid of coke over each cake.
: Leave to cool, then turn out.
: Sandwich together with cherry jam.
: Melt milk chocolate over simmering hot water and slowly spread over the top of the cake.
: Top with cherries and popping candy.
For the one above:
Spread jam over cooled sponge, then melt chocolate and pour over the top. Finish off with cherry and popping candy.
DONE!
Who got this cake?
My favourite checkout lady in Tesco.
I knew she deserved it as soon as she told me 'I flipping love cherries darl, I tell ya I ate 2kg the other day!'
Favourite Song:
ê 'Master Blaster (Jammin')
