Malteser cake

So, it was just over three years in the making, but I finally made my version of a Malteser cake.

I know, I know. It looks pretty good. How good? Seven packets of white Maltesers and two and a half boxes of the regular good. That's how good.

The cake is a chocolate malt sponge, with a dark chocolate ganache and white Malteser filling. The frosting is a vanilla malt butter icing. It's decorated with a deluge of both regular and white Maltesers

It's a fun gateaux that is pretty rich. The malt and chocolate do work well together. The frosting is particularity tasty.  The trouble is that this cake is all about the look. It's a perfectly acceptable cake and people at work were more than complementary. However, for me it fell short of delivering the mighty malty flavour punch I was after.

Things to improve:

1. Make a malt -flavour only sponge. When I made a couple of practice mini-sponges the other week I was trying to determine whether to use Horlicks or Ovaltine. The cakes were subtly malty but distinctively so. Here I think the chocolate and malt compete for attention, with neither really winning.
2. The ganache was a little too bitter, so I think a chocolate with a lower cocoa solids is the order of the day, probably about 50-60%, I reckon.
3. Equally, the layer of crushed white Maltesers was supposed to offset the ganache and bring in a textural contrast. I didn't quite use enough of the little malty ball to do this (mainly because I was so worried about not having enough for the decoration).
4. I also tried a little drizzle-type addition by making up a strong cup of Ovaltine and brushing it over the cooling sponges. However, I was a little bit scared of making the sponges too wet and I'm not sure it had too much of an effect. I think you need to use a slightly firmer cake recipe rather than a basic sponge for this to work.

Still I've got half a jar of Ovaltine left to play with so I might try out some of the tweaks. Although I'm not I'll go all out with the Malteser covering this time.

Oh and one other thing, it's a right difficult cake to cut!

(You can also see my shiny new cake turntable in both photos. I am staggered at just how much easier it makes icing). Anyhoo, on to the recipe:

Malteser Cake

Ingredients:

For the sponge:
8oz butter
5oz Muscavado sugar
3oz caster sugar
4 eggs
7oz plain flour, sifted
1oz cocoa, sifted
1.5tsp baking powder
3oz Ovaltine (or other malt powder)
4tbsp milk
For the frosting:
8oz butter
175g icing sugar (approximately)
2oz Ovaltine
1tsp vanilla extract
40ml milk
For the filling:
50g dark chocolate
50ml double cream
3 packets of white Maltesers, lightly crushed.
Decorate with as many Maltesers as you dare. Just be wary of how many it will actually take!

Method:
1. Make the sponge in the usual way by creaming the butter and sugars until pale and fluffy. Then beat in the eggs, vanilla extract and the Ovaltine (Heat the milk up and dissolve the malt powder before adding to the batter). Fold in the sifted flour, baking powder and cocoa.
2. Divide the batter between two 8" pans and bake for about 20-25mins at 180°C (or until the top springs back to the touch, the sides are coming away from the tin and an skewer comes out clean from the middle).
3. Allow the cakes to cool and meanwhile make the ganache. Warm the double cream (either above a pan of simmering water or in a microwave). Break the chocolate in to the cream and allow to melt. Once melted, whisk the mixture until cool. Place in the fridge for a short while to set then whisk again before spreading over one of the cooled cakes.
4. Break up the white Maltesers and scatter over the ganache. Sandwich the cakes together.
5. To make the frosting, beat the butter and sugar together until soft. Warm the milk and dissolve the Ovaltine in. Add the vanilla extract and Ovaltine to the butter and sugar and beat together. Add more sugar as required to get a good flavour.
6. Cover the cake in a thin layer of icing (the crumb layer) and refrigerate to set.
7. Once set, use the remaining frosting to ice the cake liberally.
8. Decorate with Maltesers.