Halberstam's Ultimate Chocolate Cake

It has come to my attention that, although busy in academia and possibly activism, Judith/Jack Halberstam enjoys their Sunday afternoons in a very British way. This means, that on a Sunday around 3pm Jack loves to have a cup of black tea with almond milk and no sugar, accompanied with a big piece of chocolate cake. Or, well, at least I would like to believe so. If this was not the case, I am totally convinced Jack would love this creation which happens to share their name: Halberstam's Ultimate Chocolate Cake.

Ingredients:

Cake

80g Self-raising wholewheat flour

80g Plain self-raising flour

30g Cocoa powder

60g Sugar

5g Baking powder

1/2 teaspoon Salt

75ml Mild-tasting vegetable oil (e.g. sunflower oil) 

125g Syrup (I used golden syrup but I am sure maple syrup would taste even better!)

220 Non-dairy milk (soya or a fancy one like almond or hazelnut!)

60g Dairy-free chocolate (70%-80% cocoa) - melted

Icing

225g Vegan cream cheese

200g Icing sugar

60g Fresh strawberries

40g Vegan margarine

Instructions

Cake

1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC. Grease a round cake tin (around 28cm diameter) with vegan margarine (if necessary, replace with vegetable oil). 

2. In a bowl mix the wholewheat flour, plain flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder and salt. Whisk the mixture to aerate and make sure no bits remain.

3. In a separate bowl (if possible) mix the oil, the syrup, the milk and the melted chocolate until smooth. 

4. Gently mix the contents of both bowls and stir until smooth. You will obtain quite a liquid mixture, as seen in the picture.

5. Pour the mixture into the cake tin and place in the preheated oven. The cake should cook for around 18 minutes. Test to see if the cake is cooked by putting a knife or a skewer into the cake and it should come out (almost) clean. If it doesn't, cook the cake for slightly longer. 

Icing

1. Mix all ingredients together until smooth. If too liquid, let cool down in the fridge.

2. Cut the cake in half with a knife or a string.
 
3. Spread half the icing on the bottom layer.

4. Replace the top half onto the cake and spread the remaining icing on top.

*n.b. In this case the icing was quite liquid and therefore the cake needed a couple of hours in the fridge.