If you ever make a cake or a batch of cupcakes and there is some mixture left over, here's a great tip:
Dr Cupcake's Great Cake Tip #43: NEVER THROW EXTRA MIXTURE AWAY.
Take the Wombles as your role model. If you are as old as me then you'll know that the Wombles, while they were underground, overground, wombling free, were ALSO making good use of the things that they find, the things that the everyday folk leave behind:
Yes indeed. And I bet they were fond of chocolate cake (although I can't say that for sure), and further, I bet you anything you like that, had they had extra cake mixture left over from a batch, they would have turned it into a smaller tin, cooked it, and come out with something..... looking rather like this:
.... looking rather like this:
- Which they would have put in the freezer, slightly flat and unattractive-looking as it was, in the certain knowledge that, ONE DAY SOON, it would find a use.
The Wombles, whilst whipping up a batch of ganache for their last cooking project, and finding that there appeared to be too much ganache for their purposes, would, almost certainly, have done.....
....THIS, and scooped it unattractively into a sandwich bag, to be popped in the freezer for a later event.
And this is exactly what you and I should do, too.....
Because, the very next time you have a special occasion and absolutely no time to make anything fancy, you can rip your little flat cake and your messy ganache out of the freezer and do this with it, and no one will ever know that you haven't slaved over a hot stove for hours making it.
These are, obviously, little squares of rich chocolate mud cake topped with a warm, half-melted ganache and topped with some fancy sugar roses.....
.... Which I had no compunction in getting out of a packet - again, if you have the time, it's wonderful to make them yourself, but if you don't, it is really worthwhile to keep a few ready made ones in the cupboard.
I hand cut the cake squares with a sharp and heavy knife. It helps if the cake is not completely defrosted, or at least still very cold, when cutting - that way it is less crumbly and less likely to break into smaller pieces.
The good thing about the 'dolloped' ganache icing is that it hides any inconsistencies or breakages in the cake squares.
I was lucky enough to have both red and white roses to top the cakes with. The red were my favorites.
And seriously one of the best things about the whole experience was the amount of washing up that I had to do at the end, which was:
Done, finito, from go to whoa in approximately 20 minutes ... and a roomful of appreciative chocolate smeared faces were none the wiser.
So, be like the Wombles, because they're cool and stuff.
Happy wombling from Dr Cupcake!
