Dinosaur Cake

Ben was 3 on Saturday, and Cathy made a very good cake. It was a genius dinosaur, green with blue M&M spots with white Maltesers for claws and teeth, and all made from a little round cake which I noticed only used half the butter and eggs of a regular cake.... handy for low fat treats, and handy when the hens are on strike and handy for when one forgets to put butter on the shopping list...

So, she forgot her recipe book (my fault as I wanted the recipe), and now she might need it for Joe's cake next Saturday, and the book is too big to scan and I won't lose this recipe if I blog it, so here goes.

A Rich Chocolate Cake from DK

Set the oven to 180C. Line a 22cm round tin with non stick baking parchment.

Lemon juice, 1 tbsp

Milk, 250ml

Stir lemon juice into the milk.

Butter, 4oz

Sugar, 4.5oz

Eggs, 2

Cream the butter and sugar together in a mixing bowl until pale and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time.

Flour, plain, 8oz

Cocoa powder, 2oz

Bicarbonate of Soda, 1 tsp

Sift the dry ingredients together. Beat in half the dry ingredients and half the milk. Add the rest of the milk and then the rest of the flour, mix until smooth. Pour the mixture into the cake tin and bake it for one hour. Then tip the cake out of the tin and leave it on a wire rack to cool.

Butter Icing

Butter, 4oz

Icing Sugar, 8oz

Colouring, if you like that sort of thing

Chocolate Icing

Butter, 2oz

Icing Sugar, 3.5oz

Cocoa Powder, 2 tbsp

Did a birthday party of 14, with some left over for coffee on Sunday and a few pieces to take to school!