Let Her Eat Cake: Mary Margaret Blanchard Cake

I have a little confession to make. I'm a fantasy geek. I loved Game of Thrones, and now I'm completely sucked into Once Upon a Time on Channel 5. Mary Margaret Blanchard (aka Snow White) is a sweet yet modest school teacher with a penchant for cinnamon on her hot chocolate. That got me thinking about chocolate and cinnamon. And seeing as last time I made a summery cake it started pouring with rain, I figured a big old chocolate cake might make the sun come out. And it did! In fact, I should probably take full credit for the last few days of beautiful sunshine.

The cake is a chocolate sponge with a hint of cinnamon and creme fraiche for moistness. The icing is a cinnamon buttercream made with muscavado sugar for some extra fudgy goodness (I increased the quantity in the recipe below as I ended up with a rather thin coating in my test run). Just like MMB, this chocolate cinnamon cake is sweet without being over the top. More importantly, it works wonders on the weather. Allegedly.

Mary Margaret Blanchard's Chocolate Cake

You'll need: 

For the cake 

• 115g butter, at room temperature
• 115g caster sugar
• 115g light brown muscavado sugar
• 4 eggs, lightly beaten
• 170g self raising flour
• 55g cocoa powder
• 2tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 6tbsp creme fraiche
• 1tsp vanilla extract

For the brown sugar cinnamon buttercream

• 100g light brown muscovado sugar 
• 100g butter, at room temperature
• 100g icing sugar 
• 2tsp ground cinnamon 
• 2-4tbsp double cream 

Make it!

• Start by preheating the oven to 180c / Gas 4. Grease and line two 8 inch (20cm) sandwich tins.
• Cream together the butter and sugars until they're light and fluffy.
• Beat in the eggs one by one.
• Sieve the flour, cocoa, cinnamon and bicarb together into another bowl to combine them evenly.
• Fold the flour mixture into the butter/sugar/egg mixture.
• Stir in the creme fraiche and vanilla.
• Spread the batter into the two tins and bake for around 25 minutes or until the cakes are cooked through.
• While the cakes are cooling, make the icing. Beat together the brown sugar and butter for a few minutes until they form a smooth paste. 
• Sift in the icing sugar and cinnamon. Beat it in. 
• Add the cream to loosen until you get a nice icing consistency. If it's too wet, add more icing sugar. Too dry? A bit more cream.
• Spread all over the cake and pray for sunshine.