Hedgehog sprinkle cake and niceness

I’ve been slow in getting recipes up recently because the oven at my rental place is unreliable. I love having my own kitchen to experiment in, but I don’t think it loves me back… not all the time, anyway!

So this recipe is basic, easy and nice. Because it is nice to be back. I find blogging such a great outlet – not having the opportunity to write posts because of lack of recipes to share saddens me somewhat.

Enough dwelling on negatives – let us focus on the nice things! I delighted over a gorgeous speckled egg amidst a collection of perfectly beige counterparts. The name of this cake came about because I had such a fun time icing it. I was aimlessly dabbing away at it when I realised (with a little giggle) that it had started to resemble a little hedgehog.

I received parcels from the Sweet Swap 2014 last week, I’ll have more details soon!

I spent Saturday in fabulous company, I had a divine breakfast with my family this morning, and I have some wonderfully busy weeks coming up. Life is lovely.

Tell me about the nice things in your life at the moment!

Cake:

• ¾ cup sugar
• 150g sugar
• 1 ½ tsp vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup almond meal
• 2 tsp bicarb
• 1 cup plain flour
• ½ cup milk

Icing:

• 170g butter
• 1 cup icing sugar
• ½ cup cocoa
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 tbsp sprinkles

Preheat your oven to 180°C and grease and line a 20cm square tin.

Cream together you sugar and butter until pale and creamy. Add in the vanilla and eggs and mix well. Add in the almond meal, the bicarb and then half of the flour and mix thoroughly. Add in the second half of the flour, all of the milk, and mix.

You may need to scrape down the sides and mix again, almond meal has a tendency to clump slightly at the edges.

Scoop your batter into the prepared cake tin and spread evenly, smoothing out the top. Make sure you get it into all of the corners!

Your cake won’t rise very much because the almond meal is so dense. This is not a bad thing – the result is a moist, compact little dessert, which has an enviable icing-to-cake ratio.

While your cake is cooling, make a start on the icing. Pop your microwave in the microwave to soften it and partially melt it. You want about 1/3 of the butter to be liquid, as this will allow you to make a smooth, workable icing without having to add any liquid.

When your butter is partially melted, add in the icing sugar and cocoa, then the vanilla. Mix until smooth and delicious.

Slather your rich chocolate icing over your cooled cake. To recreate the hedgehog look, grab a spatula and press the flat side of it lightly onto your cake and pull up gently. Repeat all over the cake with varying degrees of pressure to create great texture.

Finish with sprinkles. Lots of them.