old school baking

Some recent baking with a retro theme...classic ginger crunch from Chloe's blog, and an old favourite, St Mary's chocolate cake from our school days. The ginger crunch is a recipe for GC purists with the requisite thin biscuity base, rather than the substantial slabs more often seen in cafes these days. Delicious. Although I do also love the oaty version made famous by Takaha's Wholemeal Cafe.

The chocolate cake recipe was the one provided for the baking competition at our primary school flower shows, and is a perfect tin filler - whipped up in a flash with one bowl, and reliably good without being too rich or fancy. The incredible chocolate icing makes it a bit more special, this is truly the BEST way to top an (everyday sort of) chocolate cake. Although sometimes we used to cut the cake in half, sandwich it together with mock cream and dust the top with icing sugar. How's that for nostalgic...


I made a coffee cake too, with walnuts in it, something else we used to make a lot as kids. The recipe is over at pod and three peas, and the cake provides more retro deliciousness.



St Mary's Chocolate Cake


1 c milk
4 eggs
150 melted butter
2 tsp vanilla
4 tsp baking powder
6 tbsp cocoa
2 c sugar
2 c flour


Combine wet ingredients in a bowl and beat well. Add dry ingredients and mix to combine. Bake at 180c for 1-1 1/2 hours.