Wednesday 1 August 2007

WHEN ONLY CAKE WILL DO

Some days (more often than not) chocolate is necessary, occasionally the only thing to eat is lots of buttered toast, but yesterday I needed cake.

I spent the morning wondering how best to tackle the cake craving only managing to come to the conclusion that it must include chocolate. I went to the Broughton Delicatessen for lunch and bought a salad box of chickpeas with red peppers and feta, couscous with dried fruit and nuts, and spinach with green beans and baby corn, but somehow didn't want a slab of the fabulous looking chocolate cake that they had on the counter, I had to make my own to satisfy this very specific urge.



So, having eaten my lunch and read this week's copy of 'Grazia' (the only acceptable way to read celebrity gossip) I made a quick trip around my favourite blogs and quickly found a banana bread with chocolate and cinnamon sugar on Orangette. As our freezer is overflowing with very over ripe bananas this was perfect. If you can't wait for your bananas to defrost then do what I do and just chuck them on an oven shelf as the oven is warming up. I had to make a couple of small adjustments to the recipe, I don't own a square cake tin (another thing for my wish list) so had to use a 20cm round springform tin which meant that the cooking time was about 10 minutes longer. I also didn't top the cake with the full 2 tablespoons of sugar because, as I was sprinkling it on, it seemed a little too much. Anyway, the cake was delicious and is still delicious today. The perfect antidote to my craving.