What's Cooking: Chocolate cake with The Cake Committee

Thank you everyone for stopping by this week to read Her Little Place, I hope it's given you a nice taste of what's to come! Don't forget that the Cartolina Cards giveaway is still open until the end of Tuesday, so if you haven't entered already, head back to the original post to join in. Coming up next week, I've got an exciting My Favourite Place with the owners of one of my favourite shops to share, an inspiring How To and more! Have a good weekend in the meantime and I leave you with my new Friday feature, What's Cooking. Enjoy!

There's nothing that I like better than baking on the weekend, so on Fridays, I'll be getting in the mood by inviting passionate bakers and cooks to share their favourite recipes with readers. If you'd like to submit a recipe and food photos for Her Little Place, email me (huma@herlittleplace.com); in the meantime, sit back and enjoy this week's contribution...

I'm not sure why, but it surprised me that renowned ceramics designer Peter Ting is a baking addict and one of the founders of the cake movement taking London by storm, The Cake Committee. But when you think about it, it makes sense: why else make beautiful plates, if not to eat cake off them? Here's Peter's contribution - and don't be alarmed - it's Chocolate Mayonnaise cake. Yes, that really does say Mayonnaise. But it still looks lovely.

Peter says: "Baking is at best a hobby, and at worse an addiction. I belong firmly in the addict camp. As a founder member of the The Cake Committee, baking is important to me, but what is more so is the real understanding of why things turn out the way they do, and how to improve on techniques.

"For my 50th birthday, I was given a copy of The Cake Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum; it has yo-yoed between the kitchen and my bedside table ever since. Now, I know that Chocolate Mayonnaise cake sounds very strange (it was invented by the wife of a Hellmann's mayonnaise salesman to help him boost sales) , but I read the recipe and had to make it straight away. It's simply one of the easiest cakes I've ever made! Mix wet with wet, dry with dry, mix wet into dry and then bake: it turned out beautifully moist and tasty. And once you realise that mayonnaise is just oil and egg yolks, it doesn't seem so strange to incorporate it after all."

Down-Home Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake

28 grams unsweetened cocoa powder
8 fl oz (1/2 pint) boiling wayter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
160 g mayonnaise
200g plain flour (sifted)
200g caster sugar
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Grease and line your cake tins (I used two, 8" tins) and preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius (160 for a fan oven). Mix the boiling water and cocoa powder until it is smooth and lump free. Let it cool to room temperature, and then mix in the vanilla extract and the mayo. In another bowl, mix all the dry ingredients together. Add the liquid mix to the dry mix, and beat together to give a good texture. Place in the prepared tins and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Let the cakes cool in the tins for 10 minutes and then turn out and allow to cool. You can enjoy them as they are, or you can sandwich them together using my favourite sweet-tooth obsession of the moment - buttercream - which you can do quickly and easily by whipping ready made creme anglaise into whipped butter. Or for more indulgence, crumble Italian meringues into whipped butter. Just make sure you use unsalted butter and whisk for at least 15 minutes, until it is so pale it's almost white and the texture of thick cream.

Enjoy!

Photography: Peter Ting