This was my birthday cake. Since I made the Mint Overload Cake, I have been thinking about what other kind of cakes I would like to make that would be similar.
Two of my favourite chocolates are mint chocolate and chocolate orange. Therefore, it felt like it was time to do something with chocolate orange.
As we got closer to my birthday, I wanted to make a big cake and I knew it had to incorporate chocolate orange.
I made this cake similar to the Mint Overload Cake because that cake was really tasty.
I enjoyed making this cake as it challenged me because I only make big cakes every so often and I always struggle to get the amount of icing I need to cover big cakes.
I can never seem to get the measurements right when I make big cakes, I ever end up with too little icing or too much. I seemed to have perfected it with this recipe though.
I took this cake to work along with some Oreo Cupcakes, Vanilla and Salted Caramel Cupcakes. These cakes all went down a treat but of course the show stopper was this cake.
Orange Chocolate Cake
Ingredients
Cake
- 50 g good-quality dark chocolate
- 200 g caster sugar
- 200 g unsalted butter softened, plus extra for greasing
- 2 tsp orange extract
- 5 free-range eggs
- 200 g self-raising flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 150 g Cocoa Powder
Buttercream
- 225 g butter
- 500 g icing sugar
- orange food gel
- 1 tsp orange extract
- 2 Terrys Chocolate Orange
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease and line two 20cm/8in sandwich tins.
- Melt the chocolate in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water.
- Meanwhile, cream the sugar and butter together in a bowl until light and fluffy. Add the orange zest and juice and the melted chocolate. Slowly beat in the eggs, one at a time, until well combined.
- Sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa powder into the mixture and fold until well combined. Divide the cake batter between the two sandwich tins and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until cooked through.
Buttercream
- Beat the butter until pale and fluffy. Add the icing sugar a little at time until fully incorporated.
- Add in the orange food colouring and orange extract then mix until fully incorporated. Then fill a piping bag with a circle piping nozzle and pipe onto the first layer of cake.
- Once the bottom layer is fully covered with icing sugar, leave it for a minute to give the buttercream to harden a little bit. Then add the second layer on top of the buttercream gently, pipe more icing on to the top layer of the cake. Add a couple of slices of terry chocolate orange and enjoy.
