Masterchef, chocolate biscuits and cake!

I love Masterchef. It makes the cold winter evenings when I am not out running more bearable. My lovely friend Hellers reckons that I should enter it. But my cooking is certainly not up to scratch. And add to that the fact that I have a very diminished sense of smell (and taste), I would probably fail the ingredients challenge miserably!!!
However, whenever Hellers is top judge, I will deffo enter as she would just get rid of the rest and we would cook stuff and eat it together.

Hellers, should enter her most amazing Chicken Wings. You would get up in the middle of the night to eat them! I swear. Hellers, I want the recipe please! : )

Another recipe that I love is for Chocolate Biscuit cake. I haven't had any in years. I find that it can be very very rich and sometimes is just a little too much but I was asked would I make a large cake for my newest cousin, Austin's christening.
As I had never made one before, I first of all checked whether raisins were wanted or not and I was told just chocolate and biscuits. Nothing fancy!!

After some surfing, I came across a really simple recipe on the Odlum's website. http://www.odlums.ie/
Catherine Leyden is a regular on Ireland AM on TV3. I like her style so I knew that it would be a simple enough and reliable recipe.
Firstly, get hold of a good heavy cake tin. I decided that such an important occasion (and the fact that my family has lots of people in it) I would splash out, and I bought a brand new 10" square cake tin.

Line your tin with cling film and leave enough over the edges to fold back in on the cake when the tin is full.
For a 10" cake you will need the following. It seems like a lot, but it is a big cake!
2lbs butter, 2lbs good quality chocolate, 1 pint golden syrup, 3 packs of digestive biscuits(regular size) and 1.5 packs of rich tea.

Melt the butter and Golden syrup over a medium heat. In a glass bowl, over a simmering pot of water, melt the chocolate. While they are melting, roughly bash the biscuits and put them in a large pot.

When the chocolate is melted, add to the butter and syrup mixture. When properly combined, pour over the biscuits and mix, ensuring that all the biscuits are coated.

When mixed throught, transfer the cake mix to the pre lined cake tin. Carefully, press the mixture into the tin. I found that lifting the cake tin off the counter a little and just dropping it onto it, helped to free air bubbles and flatten the mix a little. Just be careful not to drop it completely as it will be heavy.

Fold over the cling film and push the mixture into the tin a little more. Transfer to the fridge and allow to set for about 3-4 hours. The cake will keep in the fridge for up to a week.

I flipped the cake out the day before the christening and carefully peeled off the cling film. I used a roll out fondant icing to cover the cake and some blue ribbon around the base.

It seemed to go down well and we had to rescue a big chunk of it and hide it in the fridge so it wouldn't all be eaten!

Right, waffling over. I have a shopping list to write for the baking I am doing for the Valentine's Special of the Alison Curtis Show this Thursday.

Food with natural Aphrodisiacs and some ingredients that are bound to get pulses racing! More on that later in the week.

Orls xxx