Our theme was Birthday Bakes and when I think of birthday cakes it's always a chocolate cake that comes to mind, in particular that chocolate caterpillar cake that we all had as kids. Apart from the cake being chocolate I didn't know what else to do to it so a couple of days before the event I was stood in the chocolate aisle in Asda willing for some inspiration to come to me. I spotted the Rolos were on offer and not knowing what else to do I grabbed a bag and figured I would just wing it (story of my life these days haha). 

Using Mary Berry's recipe for her Chocolate Fudge Cake from her Baking Bible my Chocolate Rolo Cake was born. I really love the lightness of the sponge in this cake although I did fiddle with the recipe slightly. It's fairly quick to make which suits me perfectly and I was able to get it in the oven in less than 10mins including preparing the tins. The smell coming from the oven was divine, I do love a good chocolate cake!

Our Birthday Bakes event was held in the Little Corner of the World tearoom in Otley and so far it's the only place in the town that serves clotted cream with their scones. Double cream is just wrong with a cream tea so this little cafe was already a winner in my book before our event had even taken place. We did have a slight dilemma of a power cut just before everyone arrived but thankfully it came back on just in time for us to enjoy copious amounts of tea and coffee with all of our cakes.

It would appear we all had the same idea with making chocolate cake which then resulted in 6 different chocolate cakes being consumed - yum!

I owe a special thanks to Sarah at the Little Corner of the World for being such a fab host. If you ever visit Otley I strongly recommend going there for a cream tea (and the best scones in town!)

Anyway... slight diversion there... back to the recipe!

Chocolate Rolo Cake

50g cocoa
6 tbsp boiling water
3 eggs
50ml milk
175g SR flour
1 tsp baking powder
100g baking spread
275g soft dark brown sugar

Icing and Filling
150g dark chocolate
150ml double cream
1 large bag Rolos

• Preheat the oven to 160C (fan)
• Warm the double cream and chocolate together until the chocolate has melted, smooth and glossy. Set aside to cool. 
• Once cool pop in the fridge to set, it needs to be firm but spreadable.
• Grease and line two 20cm cake tins.
• Mix the cocoa and boiling water together in a large bowl.
• Add the remaining ingredients and beat until smooth and well combined.
• Divide between the prepared tins and bake in the oven for 25mins until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
• Pop on a wire rack to cool.
• Once cool sandwich the cake with the chocolate ganache and a handful of chopped Rolos. 
• Spread some more ganache on the top of the cake and scatter over a few more Rolos.

Enjoy!