Chocolate Fudge Cakes

These are possibly some of the nicest chocolate cakes I have ever made. They were so rich and moist, and the icing was delicious, even if it did make me feel sick when I ate too much.. woops. I also managed to post one to my friend who has gone to France for a year on exchange.. I have yet to hear from her as to its condition/taste, though if the French postal system is anything like the UK, it might be rather stale. They were also really easy to make - no fiddly chopping up mango or stupid whisking egg whites till my arm falls off (fortunately have a new blender that has a whisk attachment, very handy).

Chocolate Fudge Cupcakes - makes 12

125g (4oz) butter

150g (5oz) light muscovado sugar
2 eggs
100g (3.5oz) self raising flour
50g (2oz) cocoa powder

0.5 tsp baking powder

Icing

  

100g (3.5oz) plain or milk chocolate, chopped

2 tbsp milk

50g (2oz) butter

75g (3oz) icing sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 180*C. Mix all the ingredients together with an electric beater until light and creamy. Divide into the 12 cases (though be careful not to overfill - could make 13/14 safely).
2. Bake for 20 minutes, or until just firm to touch.
3. Icing - Put the chocolate, butter and milk in a small saucepan and melt gently until the butter has melted. Remove from the heat.
4. Sift in the icing sugar and stir until smooth. Leave to cool a little bit (be warned it goes rock-hard if cooled too much) so it is more solid but spreadable, then spread onto the cakes, best done while they are still warm.

The icing is tasty... so either be scant and get sick eating the leftovers, or pile it on. If you let it cool too much before putting it on, it won't spread well, and might go lumpy. I found doing it straight off the stove was bad (sort of) because it all dribbled down the side and onto the baking tray. So I had to eat all the drippings, shame to waste!

Next ones should be Chocolate and Strawberry cupcakes... mmmmmmmm

MMFC