is nigella's chocolate orange marmalade store cupboard cake any good??

[nappyaddict]

can you taste the orange very much? i can't see how using marmalade would give a very strong orangey taste. this is the recipe incase you're not sure which cake i'm talking about:

125 grams of unsalted butter
100 grams of dark chocolate
300 grams of good quality orange marmalade
150 grams of sugar
a pinch of salt
2 large eggs
150 grams of self-rising flour

Melt the butter slowly in a heavy-bottom saucepan. When it's almost melted, add chocolate pieces, stir and take off the heat. Stir with a wooden spoon, until chocolate has melted.
Add the marmalade, sugar, salt and eggs. Stir thoroughly (it's okay to leave small visible chunks of marmalade in the batter).
Add sifted flour, stir and pour into a buttered and floured 20-22 cm loose bottomed cake tin.
Bake at 180˚C oven for 45-50 minutes, until the cake has set (test with a knife or wooden stick).
Leave to cool in the tin for about 10 minutes, then slide onto a plate.

In a word YES!!!

I first made this for dd1s first birthday (5 years ago) after arguing with dp about how much cake we needed to feed our guests. He always undercaters, I always go slightly mad on quantities. Anyway, I had a last minute panic and made this to supplement the Victoria Sponge I already had and it got wolfed ... every last crumb.

I wouldn't say the orange flavour is overwhelming, but I think that's a good thing. Subtlety is the way forward in things choco-orange.

I've got a different marmalade cake recipe & it is bloody lovely but not very orange-ey IYSWIM!

Personally I was disappointed. I prefer her Sour cream choc cake

did you have it as it was or did you put icing on the top?

I did it as was, and I seem to remember for dd's party did a stencil with a star and her name and sifted icing sugar through it, how arty is that!!

as it was I think - I may have diverted from the recipe. That is something I am prone to.

I felt it was a bit dry (but that could have been my oven) and if I'm having a chocolate cake I do like it moist.

Having said that, it all went at the cake sale that I made it for...

damn forgot to leave it too cool before removing from the tin and its all just fell apart.

I like it a lot but it can be a little dry. I most often make it with raspberry jam rather than marmalade though. Does need chocolate icing on top or ice cream with it, imo.

is it still dry with the raspberry jam?

oh I love it, don't find it dry at all, use good marmalade and choc, its one of my favourite stand-bys

A little less dry! Yummy though, especially with vanilla icecream.

The cherry jam version is also quite blissful.

I've made it twice. Both times I have been disappointed. I shan't bother again. There are many nicer cakes out there!

Zombie thread I know, but I made this today. I made it with morello cherry jam instead of marmalade for the first time, and it didn't taste wildly different, but was still GOOD.

The best thing about this cake is that only MIL, DD and I love it, so it tends to last a lot longer in our house than other chocolate cakes, as DH doesn't just instantly gannet the lot.

I used to make this loads, as it is so, so easy, and it is right up my street as far as cakes go (not uber-sweet, not too moist, not a bland flavour), but got out of the habit. DD is suddenly very interested in baking, and so I thought it would be good for her to help cook an all-in-a-saucepan cake rather than the sponge mixes she is used to making so far.

If its fallen apart, make a tiramisu or trifle with it. Yummy . I love this cake. I have used a jar of puréed prunes too which was lush.

My favorite chocolate cake because it is delicious, easy to make and the cleaning up is kept to a minimum. Just the pot and the bowl, you used to weigh the flour. The marmalade keeps it interesting. Most times I cut the amount of sugar back to 125 grams. It depends on the sweetness of the marmalade used. The high sugar content means you must be careful not to burn the cake. The oven should be no hotter than the 180 degrees Celsius as stated in the recipe, and do set a timer and keep an eye on it all the same. You can guess, how I know.

mynameisnot doubt you are checking back on this thread 3 years later but you have just helped me figure out how to use up a 3/4 full pot of morello jam I bought for something else. Thanks!