Once upon a chocolate
Today, I share the truth about press trips and a recipe for a beautiful chocolate cake that would be a marvellous addition to your Easter table. Or any table.
Once upon a time, when I was the food editor of Red magazine, I used to go on press trips a lot. I’ve eaten pasta in a Tuscan palazzo, sipped wine on the terraces of chateaux while looking out over the vines, eaten zebra in Cape Town, and almost fallen to my certain death from a hot air balloon in Australia. To be strictly truthful about the balloon, it was only about 30 feet in the air when it came crashing down, but it was dawn and I was barely awake. I have never felt so betrayed by wicker.
‘You’re so lucky!’ my friends would say, as I slipped my passport into my handbag again, but while I fear I may be slipping into My Diamond Shoes Are Too Tight territory here, let me tell you it was not all free-flowing cocktails and ‘May I show you to your suite, madam?’
Here’s the drill. You arrive at the airport to meet the PR for the trip and your fellow passengers. You eye each other suspiciously. It’s like the first day at school. Who’s going to be my friend? Which one of you bitches is going to steal my homework?
that trip to Amsterdam when I was very interested in finding out more about herring and stroopwafels and the guy from Loaded, well, wasn’t.
At your destination, you get on a minibus. You need to think carefully about who you sit next to, because that is the person you’re going to sit next to for the rest of the trip unless you’re happy to be thought of as an irredeemable chaos merchant. You will be spending a lot of time on the bus, as the PR attempts to cram in as many visits as possible to keep whoever’s sponsored the trip – often a tourist authority – happy. It really doesn’t matter if you’re never going to write about that new piece of machinery in the industrial cheese plant, they’re very proud of it and you are damn well going to look at it in an appreciative fashion. One way or another, you’ll be on and off that bloody bus from 7.30 in the morning until past midnight. Look grateful.
The effort to cram as much as possible into the itinerary means you have no time to yourself, to think, reflect, explore on your own. Fine, I guess, you’re not on holiday. But often the interests of your readers and those of your fellow press-trippers differ wildly. Remind me one day to tell you about that trip to Amsterdam when I was very interested in finding out more about herring and stroopwafels and the guy from Loaded, well, wasn’t.
Also, perfectly normal people begin to behave oddly. I call this press trip head. Grown humans lose their passports, leave their suitcases behind, get lost for hours, because they expect Mummy PR to cosset them from press breakfast to factory visit to town hall reception. On one trip, the quietest woman on the bus – the one who looked on disapprovingly when we all suggested we might go on to a club after dinner in Sydney – met a gentleman in the botanical gardens on the last day of the trip and decided to stay. Given we’d spent days and days on a minibus in New South Wales overhearing her taking calls from her husband asking where their son’s football socks were, what time he should go to bed and what he should put in his lunchbox as though he and his child had only just met, I can’t say I blame her. I saw her again, months later at a press lunch (something to do with lamb? I just remember Angela Hartnett making us delicious racks of lamb in an emerald green herb crust), and she looked completely different, cooler, her mousey hair dyed ink black. We both pretended we’d never met before.
But you know, it’s not all minibuses, hairnets and hangovers. I always remember driving into Tain-l’Hermitage in an open-topped car and the air being filled with the scent of chocolate. Tain, a small town in the Rhône Valley, is home to Valrhona, the famous French chocolate company. A town built on wine and chocolate. How could I not feel at home?
These days, there’s a very smart visitors’ centre, Cité du Chocolat, with tastings and cookery classes and ‘immersive’ experiences (Note to self: Does this mean dunking yourself in chocolate?), but back then it was a much simpler affair. I remember being surprised that this world-renowned chocolate was produced in such simple surroundings. Once inside the single-storey red brick factory - hair net on, all metal jewellery including wedding rings removed and locked in the safe – we went onto the factory floor to watch rows and rows of white-overalled women hand finishing chocolates in much the same way as they were finished when Albéric Guironnet set up what would become Valrhona in a former woodshop in 1922.
We left that day with goodie bags filled with chocolate samples. How very dreadful for us all. I still use Valrhona coverture chocolate chips in baking when I am feeling flush and generous. And Easter seems as good a time as any to break out the good stuff. Today’s chocolate cake is a great way to end your Easter feast, or as a centre piece of an afternoon tea. You don’t have to use Valrhona. Just use your favourite chocolate. No hairnet required.
Cherry, chocolate and orange bundt
I used dried morello cherries in this cake because I love them and I throw them into as many things I possibly can, from breakfast porridge to salads and cakes. If you don’t have them or don’t like them, cranberries, raisins or sultanas would also be good. You could substitute brandy or sherry for the kirsch, too.
I love bundt tins because they give the simplest of cakes a little glamour, a glow up as the young people say, with precious little effort from you. For this cake, I used the Nordic Ware Heritage bundt tin which was briefly, a few years ago, the most fashionable of all the tins. It appeared on more front covers than Beyonce. I still love it and use it a lot, though any six-cup/1.5l bundt tin will do.
When I posted a picture of this on Instagram, a lot of people asked me about the plate. It’s Chinoiserie Green, a design that Jasper Conran did for Wedgwood a few years ago. It was a birthday present from my best friend Victoria and remains a great favourite of mine.
For the cake:
100g dried cherries
About 150ml kirsch, just enough to cover the cherries in a small pan
250g plain flour
130g cocoa powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
160ml whole milk, you may need a little more
125ml sour cream
220g unsalted butter, softened
350g caster sugar
3 large eggs
Finely grated zest of an unwaxed orange
For the icing:
80g dark chocolate, about 70% cocoa solids, broken into pieces
125ml double cream
30g butter
2 tbsps kirsch, reserved from soaking the cherries
Put the cherries into a small saucepan and pour on just enough kirsch to cover. Bring to a very gentle simmer, then simmer for a couple of minutes. Remove from the heat and let the cherries fatten and cool completely. You can leave them for several hours if you like. Drain the cherries, reserving the liquid. Gently pat them dry with kitchen paper.
Preheat the oven to 170°C/150°C Fan/Gas 3. Grease a 2 litre Bundt tin with butter, sprinkle with flour, place in a plastic bag and shake shake shake until every part of the tin is lightly coated with the flour. Tap off any excess.
In a bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder and salt until very well combined and light, with no lumps. Sprinkle a couple of tablespoons of the mixture on a plate and toss the cherries in it lightly to coat.
In a separate bowl or a jug, whisk together the milk, sour cream and 1 tbsp of the reserved kirsch.
In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment (of course you can do this in a large mixing bowl with a wooden spoon), beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the orange zest.
With the mixer on very low, beat in a third of the flour then half the milk mixture, then repeat, ending with flour – be careful not to overprocess the mixture or the cake will be tough. If the mixture seems a little stiff, add a splash or two of milk until it has a consistency which drops easily from a wooden spoon. Fold in the cherries with a spatula.
Spoon the mixture into the pan and smooth the top with a palette knife or the back of a spoon – it shouldn’t come more than two thirds of the way up the tin. Bake for 65-70 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the thickest part of the cake comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes in the tin. Remove the cake from the tin then place on a cooling rack lined with a sheet of baking parchment. Cool completely.
When the cake is completely cold, make the icing. Place the chocolate in a heatproof bowl. Bring the cream to a simmer in a small saucepan. Pour the cream over the chocolate and leave to stand for a couple of minutes. Tip the butter and 2 tbsps of the remaining reserved kirsch (just swig any that’s leftover – it’s delicious) into the bowl and mix until smooth. Leave for a couple of minutes so that it thickens slightly. Pour over the cake and let the icing set before serving in thick slices.
Looks incredible. I want to dig into that slice.
Thank you for the chocolate recipe and that interesting story about your press trips! I'm still wondering about this zebra experience though.