Yo Joe,

You said on the phone the other day that you’ve discovered marmalade. A couple days before we had this convo, I’d been working on this recipe for a chocolate orange cake using marmalade. So I think what happened there is some telepathic communication from me that told you to look for a jar of marmalade in Henry’s cupboard and eat it.

I made this cake 4 times in 3 days. Hmmm oh dear haha. I wanted to get it right though. It is also a very fast cake to make, you pretty much just stir everything together in a saucepan and tip it into a cake tin.

It’s based on a Nigella recipe but my version is pretty different (after the 4 attempts). It’s really really good. Like someone made a cake out off jaffa cakes. Just one thing – this cake, and any chocolate cake, can dry out quite quickly if its baked for too long. So just keep an eye on it. But if it is a bit dry, it’s still cake and will still taste really good, like a cake made out of jaffa cakes.

Ingredients

Cake

• 125g butter
• 100g dark chocolate
• 100g fine cut marmalade
• 150g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (a splash)
• Zest of 1 orange
• pinch of salt
• 150g self raising flour
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder

Chocolate Ganache

The cake tastes good without this. Warm out the oven, I like eating it straight out of the cake tin.

• 50g dark chocolate
• 100ml double cream
• 1/2 tablespoon caster sugar

Method

Preheat the oven to 180. Grease a round cake tin with butter (mine is 20cm). Shake some flour in the tin to coat the base and sides, get rid of any excess flour out over the sink.

Melt the butter and chocolate together in a heavy based saucepan over a medium heat. Stir occasionally with a wooden spoon to stop the chocolate from catching and burning. One melted remove from the heat, allow to cool slightly.

Stir in the marmalade to the melted chocolate making sure there are no big lumps.

Add the sugar, eggs, vanilla extract, orange zest and salt into the saucepan. Beat with your wooden sppon to combine everything fully.

Sift the flour and cocoa powder into the saucepan and fold in. When you can’t see any more dry flour, stop mixing and pour into your cake tin.

Bake for 50-55 mins or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Allow to cool in the tin for 10 mins before turning it out.

If you want to make the ganache brake up the chocolate into small pieces and put in a bowl, set aside.

Combine the cream and sugar in a heavy based saucepan. Put on a low heat until it begins to simmer gently around the sides of the pan. You will need to swirl the pan occasionally so the cream does not catch and cook on the sides of the pan.

As soon as you see the cream simmering slightly, remove from the heat and pour over the chocolate.

Use a spoon to stir the cream and chocolate together, the chocolate will melt into the cream and you will have ganache.

Hope you enjoy the cake, send me a pic when you make it. Keep eating that marmalade.

Caitlin xoxo