200gself-raising flour or plain with 2tsp baking powder, 45p value brand/1.5kg, 6p
70gcocoa£1.19/250g, 33p this must be cocoa, not drinking chocolate which has lots of sugar and milk powder in it and won’t give enough chocolate flavour to your cake.
Fudge icing
50gbutterVitalite, £1/500g , 10p
3tblspwater
250gicing sugar1kg/£1.70, 42p
35gcocoa powder£1.19/250g, 17p this must be cocoa, not drinking chocolate which has lots of sugar and milk powder in it and won’t give enough chocolate flavour to your cake.
Separate the eggs. You don't need to be fussy, we aren't going to whisk the whites
Whisk the oil and sugar together. Add the egg yolks, beating a little between each one. Use a stand mixer if you have one, or a big bowl and a big wooden spoon.
Whisk the egg white slightly with a fork, not too much, and adding about half an eggs worth at a time, beat them into the mix. Beat a little between each addition.
Keep mixing until you have a light and fluffy mixture. Don’t keep going too long as if you mix it too long, something happens to the mixture and it begins to lose volume and go runnier.
Sieve the flour and cocoa together and fold them gently into the eggy mixture.
Meanwhile, line 2 x 20cm sandwich tins and heat the oven to 180C fan/200C non-fan/Gas Mark 6.
Pour half the mix into each tin and level off the top. Put them into the oven immediately (baking powder starts to work as soon as it gets wet) and bake for 25 minutes in a fan oven, 30 minutes in a non-fan.
Click here to start a 25 minutes timer
Remove from the oven, the top should be springy. If not quite done, pop back into the oven for 3 or 4 minutes. Don't cook them too long, the cake will be dry
Leave in the tin to cool for a few minutes to firm up a bit, then turn onto a cooling rack
Fudge Icing
While the cake is cooling, make the fudge icing
Melt 50g butter or spread with 3 tbslp water in a saucepan.
Sieve 250g icing sugar and 35g cocoa powder. Both the icing sugar and the cocoa need sieving as lumps are completely impossible to get out once they are mixed with the melted butter – believe me, I’ve tried. Give the fudge icing a bit of a beating to make it glossy. Leave to cool
Assemble the cake
When the cake is barely warm, and the fudge icing is warm, but not so warm that it is still very runny, spread about half the mix onto one cake.
Put the second cake on top and spread with the rest of the icing.
If the icing has cooled down so much it has started to harden up, warm it over a gentle heat until it softens.
Wait impatiently until the cake and icing have firmed up, then have a big wodge, maybe with some ice cream, or maybe still warm or warmed in the microwave for a few seconds. Warning, this has squillions of calories and can’t be fitted into any slimming diet unless you have the slenderest of slices and what fun is that!!!!