Double Chocolate Loaf Cake with Whipped Caramelised White Ganache

THIS POST IS SPONSORED BY DOVES FARM

Easter and Chocolate, it is a match made in heaven, or maybe just an excuse to enjoy more chocolate. Either way I couldn’t let the holiday pass without a very special chocolate recipe for you all. I wasn’t in the mood for anything too complicated but I did want a big hit of flavour, high impact, low effort. This bakery style loaf is dense but tender and has a rich chocolate flavour backed up with some Doves Farm Organic White Rye Flour. Wholemeal rye flour, which you may have seen me use many times before, especially paired with chocolate, has a strong tangy rye flavour and the added texture that comes with wholemeal flours. For this cake I wanted something that backed up the chocolate flavour but didn’t add as much of its own flavour, more of a team player than the star of the show if you will. For the frosting I went with a very simple whipped caramelised white chocolate ganache, topped with chopped mini eggs (it’s easter, they’re mandatory). If you’ve never made this type of chocolate before you can learn how to make it here, or you could just buy it.

Doves Farm Organic White Rye has a creamy off-white colour and a mild tangy flavour that is amazing in this cake. I call it a bakery style loaf, partly because it’s a large loaf but also because it’s a dense but tender loaf, it’s like if a British tea shop cake met an American pound cake and had loaf shaped baby. The rye flour adds a subtle tang which helps intensify the chocolate flavour and also helps gives this cake its characteristic texture. When you bake with rye, especially if you are substituting it for regular wheat flour, you’ll notice it absorbs more liquid than wheat flour. In this cake for example I have made versions with regular plain flour and a rye version and the latter was a noticeably thicker batter when made to the exact same recipe. To compensate for this, I have included a little more moisture than if making it with plain flour. As a general piece of advice, when it comes to alternative/ancient grains such as rye, when adding them into your baking it’s a good idea to start with a smaller amount and see how it affects your recipe. Generally if I am adding some to an existing recipe I would sub in 25% of the grain and this normally adds a new depth of flavour without changing the texture of the finished bake in any dramatic way. After that point you can add more of the grain should you think you’d like more of the flavour and if it hasn’t affected the texture in any negative way. In this cake for example I ended up using a 50% wheat flour cocoa powder mix and 50% Doves Farm Organic White Rye Flour for the perfect balance of flavour and texture. 

Doves Farm are a family owned British organic flour and food company, founded in 1978. Their Organic White Rye Flour is available direct from www.dovesfarm.co.uk or from Ocado, Sainsbury’s or Tesco. 

Double Chocolate Loaf Cake with Whipped Caramelised White Ganache
Serves 10-12

125g unsalted butter, diced
150g caster sugar
150g light brown sugar
5 large eggs
125ml sour cream
75ml strong black coffee
100g plain flour
50g cocoa powder (dutched/black)
150g Doves Farm Organic White Rye Flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
150g dark chocolate chips

Whipped Caramelised White Chocolate Ganache
150g caramelised white chocolate, finely chopped
75ml double cream
Chocolate mini eggs, roughly chopped, for decoration

@theboywhobakes When caramel meets chocolate #caramelizedwhitechocolate #caramel #bakinghacks #SixNationsRugby #JDAirMaxMode #GameTok #fypシ #tiktokbaker #chocolatelover #chocolaterecipe ♬ Why Are There Boundaries - FKJ

@theboywhobakes Whipped caramelised white chocolate ganache #caramelizedwhitechocolate #whippedganache #SixNationsRugby #JDAirMaxMode #caramel #fypシ #tiktokbaker #chocolatelover #chocolaterecipe #ganache ♬ Orange Juice - Tomppabeats

To make the cake you’ll need a loaf pan that measures 9x4x4 (the type I prefer is known as a small Pullman pan and is available here). If you only have a traditional 1lb loaf pan (the type normally called for in a loaf recipe) you can make a batter 3/5’s of the above recipe and bake for about 45 mins.

Preheat the oven to 180ºC (160ºC Fan) and lightly grease your loaf pan and line with a strip of parchment paper that overhangs the long sides of the tin, securing in place with metal binder clips.

Place the butter in a small saucepan and place over low/medium heat and cook until the butter is fully melted. Remove from the heat and set aside for the moment. 

In a large bowl add the sugars and eggs and using an electric mixer whisk together for a minute or two until fully combined. Add the sour cream, and coffee and whisk briefly to combine. In a separate bowl whisk together the plain flour, cocoa powder, Doves Farm Organic White Rye Flour, baking powder and salt. As we are using both light brown sugar and cocoa powder it is advisable to sieve this mixture as both of these ingredients have a nasty habit of clumping. Add the dry goods to the egg mixture and use a balloon whisk to gently stir the batter together. Pour in the cooled melted butter and fold with the whisk until combined. Add the chocolate chips and very briefly mix into the batter. Be careful to only mix as needed, cakes with rye flour can become gummy if mixed for too long. Scrape the batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake in the preheated oven for about 60 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Remove the pan from the oven and set aside for 20 minutes before carefully unfolding and setting onto a wire rack to cool completely. To ensure the crust of the cake is tender and hasn’t dried out, whilst the cake is still warm cover with a clean kitchen towel. The warmth of the cake is caught by the towel and slightly steams the outside of the cake helping ensure it stays tender.

For the ganache place the chocolate and the cream into a small bowl and place over a pan of simmering water. Stir occasionally until the chocolate has fully melted. Remove from the heat and stir until you have a smooth silky ganache. Refrigerate for up to 30 minutes or until the ganache has thickened up but is still spreadable. Remove from the fridge and using an electric mixer whisk the ganache until it turns into a pale and fluffy cream like texture. Spread this over the top of the cake and decorate with the chopped mini eggs.

Kept covered this cake will keep for at least 3 days.

Salted Peanut Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookies

I’ve recently moved into a new house and whilst I’ve made a loaf of bread, some brownies and banana bread, nothing makes me feel at home in a new kitchen like making a batch of cookies. This particular batch is based on my best ever chocolate chip cookies, which means browned butter and egg yolks for a fudgy texture. The flavours however took a very special turn in this batch. They have chocolate, of course, but also salted peanuts and caramel all together making for a very tasty cookie.

Before we start with the cookie dough we need to make the caramel. When thinking about how to get that caramel flavour into the cookies I thought about chopping up some chewy caramels but truth be told, I couldn’t be bothered to make any. Thankfully I remembered that in the past, when I used to make kitchen sink cookies, where my kitchen cupboards were raided for mix-ins, I used to add chunks of hard caramel instead. This caramel gives texture to the cookie plus it adds an intense caramel flavour with just a hint of bitterness which helps it stand up to the other ingredients without making the cookies too sweet.

Salted Peanut Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookies
Makes about 22

200g caster sugar
225g unsalted butter
150g caster sugar
150g light brown sugar
2 large eggs 
2 large egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
350g plain flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp fine sea salt
300g dark chocolate (I used 66% wafers but a roughly chopped bar will also work)
125g roughly chopped salted peanuts
Flaked sea salt, for sprinkling

To make the caramel line a baking tray with either parchment paper or a silicon matt. Place the caster sugar into a saucepan set over medium heat and cook until the sugar has fully melted and the caramel is a deep brown colour, that of an old penny. Immediately pour it out onto the prepared baking tray, spreading out a little so thats it not too thick. Set aside for 30 minutes or until it hardens like glass.

To make the cookie dough place the butter into a saucepan and over low/medium heat cook until the butter has melted and then, stirring occasionally, cook until the butter has browned. At first the butter will bubble and splatter, this is the water cooking out from the fat, and then it will foam. When it foams stir the butter more frequently and look for signs the browning has happened. You should be able to smell the change, the aroma will become nutty and toasty. The milk solids will also turn a golden brown. Remove from the heat and pour into a large bowl and set aside for 10 minutes to cool. When browning the butter be careful as this process happens very quickly and if you don’t keep an eye on the pan the butter can go from perfectly browned to burnt in the matter of seconds. 

Once the butter has cooled add the sugars and using an electric mixer with the beater attached beat together for a couple minutes to combine. Add the eggs and yolks and beat on medium speed for about 3-4 minutes or until the mixture is pale. Add the vanilla and mix in briefly to combine. 

In a separate bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt. Add this mixture to the butter mixture and mix on low speed just until a dough if formed. Add the peanuts and chocolate. Take a wooden spoon and bash the caramel into little pieces a cm or two wide. Tip this into the bowl with the chocolate and peanuts and mix briefly until everything is evenly distributed. Refrigerate the dough for two hours.

Just a quick note on refrigeration, these cookies contain hard caramel and excessive refrigeration or freezing will cause issues, the caramel will start to liquify and so whilst I would normally encourage you to freeze the dough for future use, with these its more of a case of make, bake and share. 

Preheat the oven to 180ºC (160ºC Fan)

Once the dough is chilled form into cookies about 70g in size. One word of caution when shaping these is that the caramel can be a little sharp. You can roll these into balls, just be careful not to stab yourself with caramel, or you can use a cookie scoop so you don’t have to touch the dough itself. Place the cookies onto parchment lined baking trays, leaving plenty of space for spread (6 cookies per tray is good for regular sized baking trays). Sprinkle with a little salt, leave off of course if you prefer, and bake for about 14-16 minutes or until golden brown around the edges and just a touch paler in the middle. You may find when baking these that they come out of the oven an unusual shape and this is down to the caramel. When the cookies bake the caramel liquifies and sets again on cooling but the melting can mean it makes the cookies spread a little randomly. To correct this I take the cookies out a few minutes before they’re done baking and use large round cookie cutter to scoot them back into shape, and then I repeat this once the cookies are baked. 

Remove the cookies from the oven and allow to cool on the baking tray for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. 

Kept in a sealed container the cookies will keep for 4 days.