Facebook has its advantages. Especially if you don’t watch television or scour the internet much – like me, then facebook can serve as an inspiration sometimes. A friend uploaded a picture of her mud cake, and I was blown away. I searched for a recipe that used oil, since I find oil based cakes more moist and soft than butter based cakes.

I found my salvation in a recipe by a brand of sugar.  They used refined flour, and that’s what I used the two times I made it, but chocolate cakes are very flexible and one can easily substitute whole wheat flour and jaggery for plain flour and sugar.

Ingredients

1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 cup milk
½ cup oil
250g dark chocolate, broken up or roughly chopped
1 cup hot strong coffee, can be strong instant
2 cups plain flour (or whole wheat flour)
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup brown sugar
½ cup cocoa
2 eggs
¼ tsp nutmeg powder
¼ cup walnuts (optional)

Chocolate Ganache Icing:
400g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
1 cup cream

Instructions

Preheat oven to 180°C. Line a 9 inch spring-form tin with baking paper and butter it.

Mix lemon juice with milk and set aside for it to sour.

Place oil, chocolate and hot coffee in a small saucepan and heat gently, stirring often, until chocolate is melted and the mixture smooth. Cool.

In a large bowl, mix the flour baking soda, baking powder, sugar and cocoa.

Mix the eggs and soured milk into the cooled chocolate mixture, combine thoroughly, and then whisk into the dry ingredients.

Pour into the prepared tin and bake for 30 to 40 min. The cake is done when fudgy crumbs still stick to the skewer. This is the sticky mud cake consistency.

Cool for 15 minutes in the tin, then turn out and cool further on a wire rack.

When cold, cut the cake in half using a serrated knife.

If you like the cake moist like I do, mix ½ cup  chocolate with enough milk to make a thin chocolate syrup, and drizzle it on the cake before icing it. Spread the chocolate ganache on the bottom layer, place the top layer carefully and smear it with ganache too, garnish with walnuts.

Chocolate Ganache
Place both chocolate and cream in a saucepan and stir over medium heat until chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth. Cool then refrigerate for 30 – 40 minutes until the mixture is a thick spreading consistency. Chill the frosted cake and serve with whipped cream.