A very impressive chocolate cake

If you Google chocolate cake, you'll get more recipes than you can poke a wooden spoon at. Most of them are absolutely delicious too, it's simply a matter of what kind of chocolate cake you're looking for. Something dense and rich like a mud cake or a torte? Something light perhaps, like a chocolate sponge or an Italian chocolate cake? How about a classic?

Well this one I particularly love. It's a great basic chocolate cake that you can cook in almost any shape tin that stays moist and delicious for quite a few days - if it lasts that long of course! You can slice it as I have here and fill the layers with a fine chocolate buttercream too. Otherwise, the essential chocolate glaze is fine and will just give it that extra hint of stickiness that truly puts this over the top. So here it is - a very impressive chocolate cake.

1. Take 3/4 cup of butter and cream it with 1 cup of fine caster sugar until light and creamy. This really is important. If you have an electric mixer let it run for about 4-5 minutes until the mix really is pale and fluffy.

2. Now take 3 eggs and crack them into a cup, mixing lightly with a fork. This will help them incorporate evenly into the butter mixture. With the mixer on low speed just slowly pour in the eggs until combined, but don't overbeat. This is where the protein can be affected by overmixing and make that cake crumb a little tough.

3. With that part done, grab 2 cups of self raising flour, 3/4 cup of good dark cocoa powder and an extra teaspoon of baking powder and sift them together onto some baking paper.

4. In another cup, pour one cup of milk, buttermilk if you have it but plain milk will do if you like. What buttermilk? Well buttermilk is slightly sour and creates a good chemical reaction with the baking agents, but here's a little trick if you want to go the extra mile - add a half teaspoon of vinegar or lemon juice to your plain milk and it will turn it slightly sour and add that extra baking oomph!

5. Now add about a third of your dry flour and cocoa mix to the bowl and mix it on low, preferably without flour flying about all over the kitchen. Slowly now!

6. Now add some of the milk whilst still mixing, then the flour, then the milk, until you have added all of the ingredients.

7. Mix the batter on medium speed for about 2 minutes just to make sure it's really well blended and then pour it into your prepared pan.

8. One word of warning - don't putt too much batter in the pan. Not too deep! Use a bigger tin if you have to and make a shallower cake - sandwich pans event - just to make sure yo're cooking it gently all the way through. One pan should bake through in a moderate 180 degree centigrade over in about 40-45 minutes, but sandwich pans done considerably quicker. Keep an eye on it - burnt chocolate isn't anyone's favourite!

So there you have it - a good basic chocolate cake that you can adapt in a heap of different ways. Try adding some orange zest for a jaffa style cake, or peppermint extract. Perhaps substitute the milk for coconut milk and top it with toasted coconut for a Bounty flavour. The choices are yours!