This Chocolate Rapeseed Oil Cake recipe was the result of a Clandestine Cake Club challenge. The theme was Blind Date. You had to bake a cake you had never baked or tasted before. Now, this was a challenge in a lot of ways. First, if I haven’t tasted a cake before it’s because I don’t think I’m going to like it. Why would I bake something I won’t like? Second, I like to have something reliable when baking for others. I want to know how the recipe is going to work and what tweaks I might need to make to have something I’ll be proud of. With this challenge I really was flying blind!
I hit upon Nigella’s Chocolate Olive Oil Cake because she happend to have tweeted about it around that time. I like chocolate but I had never tasted an olive oil based cake before. However, there was the small issue that I don’t like olives. I use olive oil all the time in cooking where I’ll never taste the oliveyness but I felt that this was one of those times where it would make a difference. I happened to have a bottle of Yorkshire Rapeseed Oil just begging to be used. I love the nutty flavour of rapeseed oil, it’s just gorgeous, and I thought this would compliment the almonds nicely. I was right, it gives a gorgeous nutty flavour and really gives another dimension to the cake. I’m really keen on trying to use this oil in more cooking in the future. I think it has a lot of potential!
The end result is a gorgeous nutty, moist, brownie like cake which would be a perfect dinner party dessert cake. (Imagine it piled up with raspberries or other summer fruits and served with lashings of whipped cream if you will!) However, it also held its own as a simple cake without any adornment. The rich chocolateyness of the cake means it really doesn’t need any help to be delicious and the decadent squidgy texture will certainly have you coming back for more!
Serves 16
50g cocoa powder
125ml boiling water
1 tsp vanilla extract
150g ground almonds
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
pinch of salt
150ml rapeseed oil (Yorkshire if you please!)
200g golden caster sugar
3 eggs
– Heat the oven to gas mark 5/190C and grease and line a 23cm springform cake tin.
– Put the cocoa powder in a mug then pour over the boiling water and the vanilla. Mix together until you get a delicious looking chocolaty paste (don’t taste it, it’ll be gross!) Leave to cool while you do the rest.
– Mix the almonds, salt and bicarb together in a small bowl.
– In a large mixing bowl combine the eggs, sugar and rapeseed oil.
– Use a handheld electric whisk to beat the sugar, eggs and oil until plae and thick.
– Add the cocoa paste to this mixture and beat in.
– Add the almond mixture and gently fold in until everything is totally combined.
– Pour the mixture intot he prepared tin and bake int he centre of the oven for 45-50 minutes. It should look just set int he middle and a skewer will come out clean when it is cooked.
– Allow it to cook for 10 minutes in the tin then run a sharp knife (I actually always use a thin bone handled knife for this) round the edge fo the cake to loosen it. Then unspring your tin and either leave to cool completely or serve warm with vanilla ice cream.
Anna in the kitchen 