Another Birthday Cake!

Now, I'm really proud of this one! And what's more it was easy peasy. I can't take credit for the idea as I nabbed it from over at The Pantry where there was a discussion over decorating a birthday cake for a 21st birthday. The cake recipe came from August's Australian Good Food magazine and the chocolates from Darrell Lee, if I'd been back in UK it would have been Thorntons!
Anyway, here's what I did:

Easiest Ever Chocolate fudge cake

225g self-raising flour
50g cocoa
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
275g brown sugar
250g soft butter
4 eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
75g melted dark chocolate

Fudge icing
200g soft butter
200g pure icing sugar
200g melted dark chocolate

Preheat the oven to 180c or 160c fan. Grease and line 2 20cm round sandwich pans
Place flour, cocoa, baking powder, sugar, butter, eggs, vanilla extract and melted dark chocolate in a food processor and process until smooth. If the batter is a little stiff, add 2-3 tbsp water and process again.
Divide mixture equally between prepared pans, smooth surface and bake for 35-40 mins, until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Cool cakes in pans for 5 mins, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
To make the icing, place butter and icing sugar in a clean processor and process until combined. Add melted chocolate and process until smooth. Sandwich together layers of cake with half of icing and top with remaining icing.

I put the batter in a single cake pan rather that having 2 halves and used half of the fudge icing to cover the cake. I used a couple of boxes of mint sticks which I cut in half and stuck round the edge. They didn't need holding up with the gold ribbon but it was there just in case! Then I just put most of the contents of a box of Darrell Lee chocolates over the top, adding some of their foil covered 'Pick and Mix' to add a bit of glamorous colour!
OH, whose birthday it is feels very special and now we're just drooling away until it's the actual day and we can eat it!