I was drawn to this recipe:
and dutifully toddled off to purchase ingredients post-fasting days last week.
In another fuck me sideways moment, I realised that this recipe calls for nearly 8 bars of chocolate.
EIGHT!!
This is not a low, or even reasonable calorie-loaded treat. I soldiered on, and produced thirty-two, chocolate-covered, biscuit-filled babies.
Oh, they is nice, but I am truly not convinced they are worth the cellulite. In fact I have worked myself up about this to the point of emailing the sisters a piece of my mind. This is basically a biscuit cake/fridge cake/rocky road thing and is so unnecessarily sugar and fat heavy it has made me feel quite cross. Particularly as they tout it as something the local children can't get enough of. Whilst bemoaning the chocolate outrage to a colleague at work, she told me of her recipe, and bought in her version for me to try.
Here they are together, mine and hers. Hers is on the left.
Visually, not much difference, and they don't taste significantly different either.
And, as an added bonus, you can't feel your own teeth rotting in your head when you tuck into her version.
Chocolate Splodge.
Meh.
These chocolate fridge cake thingys are quite interesting. They seem to have made a bit of a post-70s come-back and as with a lot of such cakes they seem to have "developed" in the process of their come-back in a way that has mixed success. My mother made a version of this in the 70s and it was absolutely delicious but it had no chocolate at all in it - just cocoa powder to give the chocolate flavour. It was hardly a health food - there was golden syrup and fat in there too (margarine not butter because my mother would never have dreamed of wasting expensive butter in baking!) and you pressed it into a much thinner layer before cutting into thin slices but I don't think it was the fat and chocolate overload these revamped versions can often be. Also we were only allowed very small squares or slices as it was deemed "very rich" - a limitation we accepted as children without quibble. Today everything seems to have to be in whopping great slabs to qualify as a treat. I must dig out the old recipe - we called it "chocolate biscuit cake". Do post the response you get to your email - it would be interesting to hear the 8 bar defence plea! E x
ReplyDeleteYes, my friend's version has cocoa powder in it. And I completely agree - a limitation accepted as children - we lived like that too! (Through financial boundaries though rather than greed restrictions!) And I totally am with you about the slab size! Do dig out the recipe and share it!!
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Shocking. Especially when the Mail are so - ahem - concerned with the size of the waistline of every single female celebrity.
ReplyDeleteChocolate is easy enough to eat on its own, without going to the hassle of opening a can of condensed milk.
couldn't agree more Penny!
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My Jordan makes a gorgeous tiffin and it always sells out but she tells me the ingredients are so expensive.. I love that she sometimes uses exotic fruits as well as raisins or sultanas. It does seem crazy to be adding condensed milk and syrup to something which began life as a treat.. probably a way of using up broken biscuits etc by lacing them with chocolate!
ReplyDeletePS Thanks for nice comments.. they are a good bunch but so many different personalities in one house is quite a strain some days!
There is an article about 3 Scottish sisters who have a cookbook out in this month's Simple Things - I wonder if it's the same women? Both cakes look very good. I find anything too chocolately a bit sickly - although I'll happily eat my body weight in jelly babies or dolly mixture. I'm not sure any cake needs condensed milk and syrup though... x
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