Monday Mood Cake - Licorice Rocky Road Cake.
Feeling grateful for thoughtful friends.
The postman brought me a surprise parcel this morning from a dear friend in Finland and it really made my day as the day did not only start as a Monday but the Monday after the kids' mid-term break which is always an extra effort to get things going smoothly again.
The parcel was a really inspirational Mystery Box. To be honest, that friend of mine had hinted earlier that she might at some point send me some dried wild mushrooms she had picked herself but the rest really was a surprise and an overwhelming one, too. Thank you again, Inari!
I have always loved those cooking programmes (for example Chopped) on TV where the contestants open a Mystery Box and then they have to cook something from scratch using the ingredients in the box. Of course they do have access to some basic kitchen cupboard stuff like flour and oil and tomato puree. I find that very entertaining and inspiring, and challenging, too. Not only what the contestants actually end up making but the way they approach the ingredients in the box - if they want to play it safe or take a small or bigger risk.
So now that I got a Mystery Box of my own, I am so going to entertain you by challenging myself and use the ingredients in the box for my cakes this week.
In the box there were the following goodies:
- wild mushrooms (porcinis and funnel chanterelles)
- milk chocolate
- white chocolate with lemon taste
- dried bilberries
- almond crocant crush
- crushed pepper candies
- licorice bars with lemon filling, blueberry-raspberry filling and wild strawberry filling
The postman brought me a surprise parcel this morning from a dear friend in Finland and it really made my day as the day did not only start as a Monday but the Monday after the kids' mid-term break which is always an extra effort to get things going smoothly again.
The parcel was a really inspirational Mystery Box. To be honest, that friend of mine had hinted earlier that she might at some point send me some dried wild mushrooms she had picked herself but the rest really was a surprise and an overwhelming one, too. Thank you again, Inari!
I have always loved those cooking programmes (for example Chopped) on TV where the contestants open a Mystery Box and then they have to cook something from scratch using the ingredients in the box. Of course they do have access to some basic kitchen cupboard stuff like flour and oil and tomato puree. I find that very entertaining and inspiring, and challenging, too. Not only what the contestants actually end up making but the way they approach the ingredients in the box - if they want to play it safe or take a small or bigger risk.
So now that I got a Mystery Box of my own, I am so going to entertain you by challenging myself and use the ingredients in the box for my cakes this week.
In the box there were the following goodies:
- wild mushrooms (porcinis and funnel chanterelles)
- milk chocolate
- white chocolate with lemon taste
- dried bilberries
- almond crocant crush
- crushed pepper candies
- licorice bars with lemon filling, blueberry-raspberry filling and wild strawberry filling
I decided to start with the licorice bars with blueberry-raspberry filling (the Moomin ones) and wild strawberry filling (the Angry Birds ones) as my elder daughter had some time ago suggested that I should bake a Rocky Road cake with licorice, and these bars looked more than suitable for such a cake!
To make it a cake instead of just Rocky Road, I baked a gooey base first.
After the base had cooled down, I topped it with chopped licorice, mini marshmallows and walnuts and then covered it with milk chocolate and put it in the fridge for an hour to set.
The cake really turned out nice. Gooey and chewy as I wanted it to be and you could taste the berrylicious licorice well which was my aim. These Finnish licorice bars really rule!
Licorice Rocky Road Cake
Base
150 g butter
150 ml soft brown sugar
100 ml granulated sugar
2 egg yolks
1 egg
100 g milk chocolate, melted
300 ml plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
Rocky Road Filling
200 g milk chocolate, melted
100 g (your favourite) licorice, chopped
100 g mini marshmallows
50 g walnuts, chopped
1. Preheat the oven to 175 C / 350 F.
2. Cream together butter and sugars.
3. Add yolks and egg and mix well.
4. Mix together flour and baking powder and add to the butter-sugar-egg mix together with the melted chocolate.
5. Line a square cake pan 23 cm x 23 cm with baking paper. My favourite way to do this is to wet a piece of baking paper and crumple it into a ball to get rid of the excess water and make it softer so it is easier to line the form.
6. Spoon the batter evenly in the pan and bake in the oven for about 20 minutes. The base needs to be left a little sticky.
7. Let the base cool but do not remove it from the pan.
8. Spread some melted chocolate on the base and then evenly licorice, marshmallows and walnuts. Pour the rest of the chocolate on top evenly and press a little.
9. Place the pan in the fridge for an hour before serving.
Sounds good! You are so creative!
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