What’s your favourite, dark and bitter or milky and sweet? Whichever, there is nothing like chocolate to make a bad day much better!

As we know, Britain is a nation of chocaholics and we spend more than £3.5 billion a year on the lovely choccy stuff, which is way more than any other European country.

Now experts have confirmed that chocolate truly is good for our health (well the dark stuff anyway). According to Swedish scientists, people who eat chocolate after a heart attack may be less likely to have another heart attack. Chocolate boosts brain power and lifts depression too.

Nestle were asked to bring back Black Magic by the dark chocolate fans, so, after two years away from the shelves, Nestle brought back Black Magic!

The best dark chocolate has the highest percent of cocoa, so 70%, or even better 85% and dark chocolate has around 40 less calories per 100g than milk chocolate. It is full of antioxidants and anti-coagulants which make the blood flow more freely and help fight conditions that can lead to heart problems.

Dark chocolate can reduce cholesterol, cutting it by up to 10% and it also reduces the risk of blood clots by upto 75%.

It’s a myth that eating chocolate is addictive and causes spots. It’s more likely that hormones or general bad diet are to blame.

So, go on – give it a go, try a good, high cocoa content, dark chocolate and make yourself feel truly better!

For this wonderful recipe, I recommend a good dark chocolate with at least 70% cocoa solids because it gives a more chocolatey, fuller flavour to the chocolate cake. Green & Blacks chocolate is my favourite for this chocolate cake recipe.
Serves: 10
Takes: 50 mins, plus time to cool down

Ingredients:
For the chocolate cake:
200g Green & Blacks dark chocolate, broken into small pieces
200g light muscovado sugar
140g butter, softened
5 eggs, separated
100g plain flour
1tsp baking powder

For the chocolate cake icing:
250ml double cream
55g marshmallows
250g Green & Blacks dark chocolate, chopped

Directions:

1. Heat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4.
2. Line a 20cm loose based cake tin with greaseproof paper.
3. Boil a pan of water and turn the heat down to a simmer.
4. Put the chocolate pieces into a bowl and melt it over the pan of simmering water.
5. When all the chocolate has melted, put it to one side to cool a little.
6. In a large bowl beat sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.
7. Add the egg yolks one at a time and beat them well as you add them.
8. Gently fold in the flour and baking powder, then stir in the melted chocolate.
9. In a separate bowl whisk together the egg whites until they form peaks.
10. Fold the egg whites gently into the chocolate cake mixture.
11. Tip the finished cake mixture into your ready prepared cake tin.
12. Bake in the oven for about 35 minutes.
13. Check it’s ready with a skewer, if it comes out of the cake clean then it’s ready, if not then bake for a little longer.
14. Cool on a wire rack.

For the icing, heat together the cream and marshmallows until the cream is just boiling and all the marshmallows have melted into the cream, you must stir the icing all the time.
Add the chopped chocolate to the mixture and stir until it’s smooth and creamy.
Chop your cooled chocolate cake in half horizontally and spread over a little of the icing. Sandwich together and then spread the rest of the icing over the top of your cake.
Now enjoy!

Chocolate Cake Recipe was originally a one page site for my all time favourite chocolate cake recipe.

Then along came Chocolate Cake Recipe – The Blog!

This is where I intend to try lots of new and old chocolate cake recipes to see if any of them can beat my favourite. Hopefully, along the way, I will meet some like-minded people who will read, comment and share their opinions (and recipes too).

I look forward to my mission – hope you will join me!