As promised, here is my favourite chocolate cake recipe – easy and foolproof, and deliciously, decadently rich and morish. It’s an ideal base cake to decorate for an occasion, and it keeps well (two to three weeks).

Ingredients:

250 g unsalted butter

250 g dark chocolate (I love Green & Black’s)

8 tsp fine instant coffee

180 ml just-boiled water

150 g self-raising flour

150 g plain flour

60 g fine cocoa powder (again, Green & Black’s is divine)

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

550 g caster sugar

4 medium eggs

8 tsp vegetable oil

125 ml full-fat milk

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 160 ^oC. Grease and line a 10-inch round tin.
2. Stir together the butter, chocolate, coffee and hot water over a low heat until all ingredients have melted and merged.
3. Sift together flours, cocoa and bicarbonate of soda. Stir in the sugar.
4. Beat together the eggs, oil and milk in a jug. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and pour in the egg and chocolate mixtures. Stir gently until you have a runny, well-combined mixture.
5. Pour the mix into the tin and bake for 1 hour 50 minutes until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Cool the cake in the tin.

Enjoy!