rumtumtigger

How do you make a half a punnet of strawberries and a tub of cream stretch to make a tea time treat fit for a king? Let me show you…

It was a really hot summers day here in Cape Town yesterday and I had a craving for strawberries and cream. So I went to the fridge, and what did I find…? My darling daughter, also known as the Strawberry Monster had munched half the punnet of strawberries. Now how was I supposed to make strawberries and cream for everyone? That was when I decided to get creative and make a plan.

A few months ago, I shared an egg and dairy free recipe for chocolate cake that is used by the Mount Nelson Hotel. You can find this recipe over here: http://blogs.food24.com/rumtumtigger/easy-chocolate-cake-egg-and-dairy-free . I made the chocolate cake again yesterday and, while it was baking, I sliced up most of the strawberries, but I kept 8 aside to make the decorations. I scattered about half a cup of icing sugar over the sliced strawberries to draw the juices out and placed it in the fridge. I then melted some dark chocolate (about 50g) and dipped the remaining strawberries. I also put this in the fridge while I waited for the chocolate cake to cool.

Once the cake cooled completely, I piled the strawberries into the center of the cake and poured over the juice. Since this didn’t cover the surface of the cake completely, I added a ring of sliced bananas to go around the sliced strawberries. I then beat up about 200ml of cream and spread this across the fruit topped cake. I decorated it with the chocolate dipped strawberries and grated over a bit more dark chocolate.

So in summary, the list of ingredients used to decorate the chocolate cake looked a little like this:

Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:
1 ½ cups flour
½ tsp bicarb
2 tsp baking powder
1 cup castor sugar
3 tbsp cocoa powder
½ cup oil
25ml vinegar
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 cup boiling water

Method:
1. Combine the flour, bicarb and baking powder.
2. In a second bowl combine the sugar, cocoa and stir.
3. Add the oil, vinegar, vanilla essence and water to the sugar/cocoa mixture.
4. Pour into the flour mixture and stir.
5. Bake at 170°C for approximately 15 minutes.

Topping

150g strawberries, 100g sliced, 50g dipped in dark chocolate

1 small banana, sliced

125ml icing sugar, to scatter over the sliced strawberries

50g dark  chocolate, melted plus another 25g, grated

200ml fresh cream, whipped

No exact measurements were used to create the topping of this cake so please use your discretion. The options are endless. If I’d had some caramel condensed milk, I would have spread this over the cake and topped it with sliced bananas and cream. Also, by using fresh cream, you are negating the whole dairy free component of the cake so please feel free to use a dairy free topping (like Orley Whip). 

The cake turned out really well and I almost had to put a lock on the fridge to stop the family from going back for third and fourth helpings. Give it a try and let me know how it turns out.