Triple Chocolate Lamingtons

I don’t get a lot of mail (that is addressed to me anyway) but once a month I get Gourmet Traveller and Delicious magazines delivered, which brighten my day when I find them waiting in my letter box. I like to flip through the pictures first which is usually around dinner time so I am generally drooling. This particular cover photo (from the March 2012 Gourmet Traveller) inspired an extra amount of drool, probably because of the triple-chocolate name dropping going on.

It’s not the most straightforward recipe to use but these lamingtons were a lot of fun to make, especially the dunking cake in chocolate part. They didn’t turn out exactly like the picture in the magazine but were pretty close and still tasty!

INGREDIENTS

Cake

100g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped

60g butter, chopped

8 eggs

300g caster sugar

180g plain flour

60g cocoa powder

2 teaspoons baking powder

200g (4 cups) coconut flakes

Raspberry Jam

250g raspberries (about 2 punnets)

120g caster sugar

Juice of 1 lemon

Chocolate-raspberry Cream

200ml thickened cream

120g dark chocolate, melted

20ml raspberry liqueur

80g raspberries, coarsely crushed

Chocolate Glaze

60g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped

240g pure icing sugar, sifted

80g cocoa powder, sifted

60ml (1/4 cup) milk

METHOD

Cake

1. Preheat oven to 180°C and butter and line a square 21cm cake tin.

2. Melt half the chocolate (50g) and half the butter (30g) in a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Stir until smooth and keep warm.

3. Whisk half the eggs (4) and half the sugar (150g) in an electric mixer until pale and tripled in volume (for about 5-6 minutes).

4. Sift the half the flour (90g) and half the cocoa powder (30g) three times into a large bowl.

5. Fold flour mixture into egg mixture in two batches.

6. Fold in melted chocolate mixture.

7. Spoon mixture into prepared tin and smooth the top. Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes and cool on a wire rack.

8. Repeat steps 1 to 7 with remaining ingredients. I’m not sure why the recipe tells you to make the mixture twice, I did it this way but it would probably be easier and quicker to just make it with the full amount of ingredients and divide the mixture equally into 2 identically sized tins.

Raspberry Jam

1. Stir raspberries (I used frozen raspberries because fresh were too expensive for my liking), sugar and lemon juice in a saucepan over medium-high heat until sugar dissolves.

2. Bring to the boil and cook until thick and jammy (10-15 minutes), then cool completely.

Or you can just buy jam.

Chocolate-raspberry Cream

1. Whisk cream, melted chocolate and liqueur (I used Gin because I didn’t have any raspberry liqueur) in an electric mixer until soft peaks form (3-4 minutes). Be careful not to over whisk as the mixture will separate.

2. Fold in raspberries and refrigerate until required.

Chocolate Glaze

1. Stir chocolate and 190ml of water in a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water until smooth (2-3 minutes).

2. Remove from heat, add icing sugar and cocoa and stir until smooth.

3. Stir in milk.

Making the Lamingtons

1. Turn one cake upside down and spread jam over the top.

2. Spread with the chocolate-raspberry cream and refrigerate until the cream is just firm (about 10-15 minutes).

3. Put the remaining cake on top (normal way up) and push down so it sticks. When I did this the filling spilled out the sides so I got a knife and smushed it back in to make the sides smooth.

4. Refrigerate layered cake until firm, about 1 hour. Don’t skip this step as the cakes will fall apart when you try to dip it in chocolate.

5. Once cooled, cut the cake into squares (the recipe says 7cm but make them however big you like).

6. Dip each quickly in chocolate glaze then roll in coconut.

7. Stand until set, about 1 hour, then serve.

I’m not convinced the final result was worth the messiness it caused (I may have had chocolate smeared on the bench, floor, sink, cupboards and my clothes). But it was fun to try making a classic Australian delicacy that I used to love eating as a treat at my grandparent’s house!