Bakes & More   +  yummy

This is obviously not a pavlova. Do you know how hard it is to get a good picture of a pavlova?

This is a birthday cake, as you may have gathered from the writing on it. It was not a cake that I made but it was no less delicious for that with layers of chocolate cake and chocolate frosting surrounded by white choclate cigarellos. Even better, there is still half of it sitting in my fridge so we won't go hungry this week.

I celebrated my 28th birthday at the weekend. 28 really does feel quite old. It's the sort of age where you should be starting to settle down and be responsible and do all those things that grown ups do. You should possibly not spend a Friday evening trying to see if you can make your boyfriend laugh sufficiently that the chocolate brownie he's eating comes out his nose (but it's okay because I was 27 when I did that).

To mark the occasion, I decided to make a list of 28 things I would do this year. Some are silly. Some are jobs that I've been putting off for longer than I care to think. Some are things that I should be doing anyway but don't. There will be updates throughout the year no doubt.

1. Take a picture every day. My first picture was of my new Kelly Moore bag which I am in love with. I have the best parents ever.
2. Step away from the AV button and embrace manual mode on my camera.
3. Go through the big box of photographs and put all the pictures in albums.
4. Save at least a quarter of my salary a month
5. Sort out the box of paperwork under the bed.
6. Take all the rubbish cluttering up the spare room to be recycled.
7. Make a will.
8. Learn how to wrap up gifts nicely.
9. Hang my clothes up every night. 10. Never go to bed with a sink full of dirty dishes.
11. Take a couple of months off work.
12. Leave work before seven at least one night a week.
13. Make it to bed before midnight during the week.
14. Hit up the West Coast of America. California here I come!
15. Make at least a start on reading 'War and Peace'
16. See at least one play a month.
17. A year without hangovers.
18. Lose twenty pounds. I'm nothing if not ambitious...
19. Have one meat-free day a week.
20. Start running again now that my joints are a bit happier. 21. Only wear clothes that make me feel good.
22. Learn how to use the iron.
23. Keep my jewellery box tidy and untangle all the bits I don't wear because they're a mess.
24. Clean the oven at least once a month.
25. Learn how to apply liquid eyeliner.
26. Wear perfume regularly, not just on special occasions
27. Floss daily, not just when I remember.
28. Buy myself flowers.

But onto the food which is, after all, what you're here for. As tradition dictates, on the day of my birthday, my mother hosted a small lunch party for my extended family. It is my cousin's birthday a week or so before mine (hence the joint cake) and it is a perfect opportunity to come together, drink a couple of glasses of champagne and eat a delicious meal. My contribution to the feast was a chocolate pavlova.

It's a hybrid of a Nigella recipe and a Martha Stewart recipe. You have here a rich chocolate meringue, studded with chunks of dark chocolate topped with a silky smooth dark chocolate cream and a lightly whipped vanilla cream. The various consistent parts were made the day before and the whole thing was assembled shortly before serving. It went down as well with my young cousins as it did with my elderly grandparents. When plates are scraped clean even after everyone had said they were too full really for dessert, you know you're on to a good thing.

~
Double chocolate pavlovaMeringue base from a recipe from Nigella LawsonChocolate cream from a recipe from Martha Stewart Yield: Serves 10 - 12
Ingredients

For the meringue:

• 8 egg whites
• 400g caster sugar
• 4 tbsp cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon balsamic vineager
• 75g dark chocolate, chopped

• 6 egg yolks
• 85g caster sugar
• 200ml double/heavy cream
• 180ml whole milk
• Pinch salt
• 300g dark chocolate, broken into pieces

• 500ml heavy/double cream
• 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. Line a baking tray with parchment paper.
2. To make the meringue, beat the egg whites until soft peaks form and then gradually add the sugar until the mixture is smooth and glossy.
3. Add the vinegar, cocoa and chocolate and gently fold to combine.
4. Spoon the mixture onto the baking tray in a big circle/square, turn the oven down to 150C/300F and bake for 1 - 1 1/2 hours. When cooked (the bottom feels hollow) turn the oven off but leave the meringue in there until it has cooled down.
5. To make the chocolate cream, whisk the egg yolks and 3 tbsps of the sugar in a bowl.
6. Heat the cream, milk, salt and the rest of the sugar in a saucepan and bring to the simmer. When hot, pour a third of the mixture into the eggs, whisking consistently and then pour the egg mixture back into the saucepan. Cook the mixture over a low heat for 5 minutes or so until it has thickened and covers the back of the spoon.
7. Take off the heat and add the chocolate and stir until melted.
8. Strain through a sieve into a bowl placed in an ice bath (or a sink of cold water). Keep stirring as the mixture cools. The chocolate mixture will keep for three days in the fridge if you place a piece of cling film on the surface but you will need to get it back to room temperature before serving.
9. To make the whipped cream, whisk the cream and the vanilla until stiff and smooth.
10. To assemble, pour the chocolate cream over the meringue base. Top with the whipped cream and any chocolate decorations that take your fancy.