Domestic Goddess

Blogging must be the most self-centred activity I have in my life, so you'll need to forgive me if some of the posts are a little self-congratulatory. After all, you're effectively reading my diary, and if I can't say nice things about myself in my own diary, then what's the point?

So, as you'll have noticed, this week has seen Isabel celebrate her 5th birthday and this has pretty much dominated our world. Today, I hope, saw the last official celebration of the great event (some three weeks after the first celebration - it's been a long, drawn out affair!) - we invited my Dad and stepmother plus my brother and sister round for a birthday BBQ and cake. Husbandio invested in a new BBQ (any excuse, he's been desperate to get one for months) and I took the brave decision to make a cake. I say brave because I've never made a cake before. Actually, that's not true. I made a carrot cake once but it was a bit heavy going.

This time though, I played it safe, and went with Nigella. In my experience you can't go wrong with Nigella - we did her turkey one year (including basting it in a bucket, an action later brilliantly lampooned by the Gavin & Stacey Christmas special) and it was brilliant. Her sprouts with chestnuts and pancetta were also superb, and my little brother, 12 at the time, even went back for seconds. Can't be bad.

I came across the recipe in question almost by accident though. I bought some muffin tins and wanted a chocolate chip muffin recipe with which to christen them. Found a simple looking recipe in Nigella's Feast book, but then I got to skimming through the book, as you do, and found her Chocolate Maltesers cake. Isabel loves Maltesers, and as soon as she saw the picture it was a done deal. So, last night Husbandio and I girded our respective loins, put on our aprons (well, I did) and made the actual cake part. This morning I made the buttercream icing (so yummy that my sister asked if it was Betty Crocker, cool!) and put the whole thing together. It was a delicious dessert to round off a lovely BBQ, and miraculously had just the right texture. Everyone very impressed, myself included. And quite surprised! Am relieved it's all done though - I've had two nights of cake making dreams, which is quite enough, thank you.

Nigella's version (with apologies for nicking the copyright on this photo...)

My version. More Maltesers, you'll note! She has a nicer plate but I have a wasp tile behind for comedic effect.