Cookies & Cream Chocolate Cake

A big hello and happy new year to you, it's almost the middle of January so saying 'happy new year' is probably a bit odd but I've not actually posted anything on here for quite a while (since last year). One of the reasons the content has been lacking in the blog department recently is because I have just bought my own house with my boyfriend and we moved in slightly before Christmas, so as you can imagine, things have been a little bit hectic for the past few months. Now that we've fully settled in and Christmas has been and gone, I hope to be posting more frequently and I hope that this is the first of many blog posts to come this year.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, everybody loves a bit of chocolate cake from time to time. So why not make this one of those times and give this recipe a go. I made this cake for my Dad's Birthday a few months ago (late last year) and it was absolutely delicious. The sponge was rich and moist and the buttercream had just the right amount of sweetness with an element of crunch, provided by the Oreo cookies. It's really simple and a joy to make, so I'd highly recommend it if you're looking for a simple cake that will please pretty much anyone.

Chocolate Cake Ingredients:

340g Plain Flour

525g Caster Sugar

130g Cocoa Powder

2 ¼ tsp Bicarbonate of Soda

2 ¼ tsp Baking Powder

3 Eggs

375ml Milk

190ml Vegetable Oil

3 tsp Vanilla Extract

375ml Boiling Water

I have used this chocolate cake recipe before, it's the same one I used when I baked the Harry Potter Birthday Cake and when I made the Death by Chocolate cake. This time however I have used a larger quantity of each ingredient because I wanted a bigger 3 tier cake.

• All you need to do to make the chocolate sponge is to mix all of the cake ingredients together (except the boiling water) in your electric mixer or a large bowl until fully combined. Then you can add the boiling water, bit by bit. The mixture will become very runny, which is normal, so don't worry. Give the cake batter a good mix and then divide it evenly between three lined baking tins and bake at 180° for approximately 25 minutes.

Cookies & Cream Icing Ingredients:

300g Unsalted Butter

800g Icing Sugar

5 tbs Semi Skimmed Milk

1 tsp Vanilla Extract

75g Oreo Cookies

150g Double Stuff Oreo Cookies

• While your cakes bake you can prepare your cookies and cream buttercream. Start by beating the butter at a high speed until pale, then add the icing sugar and continue to mix until thick and smooth. 
• Add a dash of milk and vanilla extract before smashing or blending approximately 1½ packets of Oreos (1 packet of Double Stuff Oreos and half a packet standard Oreos), I did this using a Nutri Ninja blender. Bare in mind though that you don't want the chunks of Oreo to be blended too finely as you want the Oreo crumbs to be visible in your buttercream. Once you have smashed or blended your Oreos, add them to the mixture and stir until the blended Oreo cookies are dispersed evenly. 
• Once the three sponges have fully cooled, trim if necessary and then apply a generous portion of the buttercream between each layer when stacking the sponges. When all three layers have been successfully trimmed and stacked it is then time to apply a crumb coat (a thin layer of the buttercream around the sides and on the top of your cake to seal in any crumbs) and allow to harden in the fridge for 1 hour.
• Once the crumb coat has hardened apply a thicker layer of buttercream all over the cake and smooth using a cake scrapper or pallet knife.

Decoration Ingredients:

75g Oreo Cookies

100g Dark Chocolate

100g Double Cream

• You could leave your cake as it is but if you want to jazz it up a little bit you can melt some dark chocolate with double cream in a saucepan over a medium/low heat. Stirring almost constantly as to ensure the chocolate doesn't burn.
• Once the chocolate and double cream mixture is thick enough to be spread, make a shallow well in the buttercream on the top of your cake and spoon/pour in some of the melted chocolate mixture. Then using a pallet knife, spread some of the chocolate around the bottom edge of your cake before topping it off with half a packet of roughly broken up Oreos.

Thanks so much for reading, I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and New Year's and that you enjoyed this post from me. Let me know if you'd like someone to make you a cake like this or alternatively if you'll be making this cake for yourself or someone else any time soon. On another note if you're interested in any DIY or home improvement updates or pictures, I have been using Instagram stories a lot more recently as well as Twitter to post updates about my new house, so you can check me out on those if you're interested.