Marbled Chocolate and Coffee Cake

There are so many occasions when a coffee cake is perfect, tea parties, birthday parties...or just that you're feeling peckish ;) But what goes better together than coffee and chocolate?

So I decided to make this Marbled coffee and chocolate cake for the office.

Ingredients 

250g Unsalted Butter (softened)

250g Caster Sugar

2tsp Vanilla Extract 

4 Large Free Range Eggs (beaten)

250g Self Raising Flour

1 Good Pinch Salt 

2-3 tbls Milk (for mixing)

100g Cocoa Powder

2tbls Coffee 

Icing Sugar

Butter 

Coffee 

Method

Preheat the oven to 180'C 

Cream the butter and sugar together until it is soft and fluffy. This will take at least 4-5 minutes in an electric mixer, and it's incredibly important to make sure that it is properly creamed.

Mix the vanilla extract into the beaten eggs 

One tablespoon at a time add the egg mixture to the creamed sugar and butter. Make sure that the mixture is beaten together each time you add the eggs or the mixture will curdle.If done correctly, this will give you a really smooth silky mixture.

Stir the flour and salt together, and then sift into the wet mixture. Fold it in using a metal spoon (this will mean the least amount of air is lost) making sure not to over fold. 

Divide the mixture in two and then divide one half into two again. In to the full half, fold in the cocoa powder to create chocolate mixture. Add a few table spoons of milk until the mixture is of dropping consistency. 

Then, add cocoa powder into half of the rest of the mixture. 

Dissolve two table spoons of coffee in boiling water, and spoon this in to the other mixture until you have the coffee flavor that you want.

Now to construct the marbled effect. In one 20cm round baking tin spoon in the half coffee mixture and half chocolate mixture into seperate halves. Gently tease the mixture around, into a ying/yang shape. 

Then in the other half, add the rest of the chocolate mix and then bake each half at 180'C for around 20-25 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. 

For the icing, make a standard buttercream, and add more coffee until it is a gentle coffee colour and taste.

Smooth the icing in between each layer of cake, and then around the sides and over the top. Dust the cake with cocoa powder and enjoy.

This cake is moist, and quite dense but goes down a treat. Not only that, but it offers a great surprise because you never know which side you're going to get ;) 

Enjoy CX