Well, the flat-warming-slash-birthday celebration thingy was a success. Jan made guacamole, which was delicious (and also happens to be one of the things on his 101 things list – yes, he’s doing one too). Almost all of my chilli was eaten, and two people even took some home in tupperware tubs so it must have been good. And I made flat-warming cake, which I am now going to share with you, my internet pals, because it’s just too damn good not to. It is also my entry for the cake category of the Belgian Waffle Village Fete and believe me, it beats aubergine bee hands down.
Picture number one shows the basic cake, prior to icing. It was supposed to be chocolate cake. It looks more like my Grandma’s Yorkshire Parkin… all dark and sticky. I blame this on the random German syrupy stuff that I used in place of golden syrup. (Note to people living in Germany – if you replace the golden syrup in a recipe with Grafschafter Goldsaft it will not turn out like you’re expecting. Trust me on this one!) Also, notice how thin it is. I expected it to rise more than that, but apparantly using extra baking powder in the absence of self-raising flour (which doesn’t exist in Germany) does not work. Who knew?
Stage 2 in the cake making process… chocolate butter icing. I had to add extra cocoa powder to mine because it was far too ridiculously sweet, even for me. The recipe called for 175 grams of icing sugar with only 75 grams of butter and two table spoons of cocoa powder. 175 g of icing sugar is just insane!
And now for the moment you’ve all been waiting for… the finished product.I give you Flat-Warming Cake… or what happens when you let a person with no artistic talent whatsoever loose with M&Ms, little sugar stars and the mini breadstick things from those nutella dip cartons…
It’s supposed to be my building, except one floor is missing because I ran out of space. My flat is on there though – the white window at the top. Also, check out my flower. And my tree. I am totally proud of them… in a half-amused kind of way.
Confuzzledom 
Very beautiful darling although I do have to say that baking powder and plain flour will work in place of SR, it is 2tspns of baking powder per cup of flour for SR, maybe you didn’t use enough? Still a masterpiece of cake decoration, you should embark upon a new career!
Mmmmm cake!
Wow! That looks super cute and yummy!
That is one excellent cake! And do not sell yourself short: you have lots of creativity in you! (I thought the aubergine bee was magnificent!)
Chili recipe please!! 🙂
Looks great! You can’t go wrong with chocolate cake! 🙂
I love the cake! Looks almost too good to eat. Almost. 🙂
Ali – well according to what i wrote down 1 tsp of baking powder added to 200g of normal flour should be enough, so that’s what I did. Then another teaspoon for what the recipe asked for but I still ended up with flat cake.
J – wanna piece? 😉
TaraSG – thanks 🙂
pinklea – Creativity perhaps, but unfortunately I lack the artistic gene to make what IK’m imagining reality… which I suppose is why my creations look so much worse to me than to outsiders, because I know what I wanted them to look like!
sleepyjane – so that’s a cookie recipe and a chili recipe you need from me. Right, working on it…
Hannah78 – it tasted pretty good – although more like some kind of treacle cake than chocolate (stupid German ingredients…)
Amanda – but only almost 😉 Thanks!