Halloween drip cake recipe

This Halloween drip cake is drizzled with a blood-red strawberry puree and flavoured with chocolate and vanilla.

The perfect Halloween birthday cake and ideal for slicing in front of guests to reveal the inner gory surprise. The rich dark chocolate drip and strawberry puree 'blood' makes the perfect flavour combo as well as create a ghoulish Halloween effect. This cake serves 12 and take just 40 minutes to bake.

Ingredients

• 225g unsalted butter
• 225g caster sugar
• 275g self raising flour
• 2tsp baking powder
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 4tbsp milk
• 1tsp vanilla extract

For the blood

• 200g strawberries, chopped
• 100g caster sugar

For the buttercream

• 250g soft unsalted butter
• 500g icing sugar
• 100ml double cream
• 1tsp vanilla

For the chocolate drip

• 100g 70% dark chocolate, melted
• 1tbsp vegetable oil

You will also need

• 3x 6” cake tins, lined with baking parchment

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C. In a mixing bowl beat the butter and the sugar until light in colour. Gradually incorporate the eggs and gently fold in the sifted flour and baking powder to mixture. Next add in the milk and vanilla, then pour into the prepared cake tins and bake in the oven for 25-30 mins, until a skewer inserted into the center of the cake is removed clean.
2. Allow the cakes to cool in their tins, then use a wooden skewer to poke holes all over the sponges.
3. To make the 'blood': in a small saucepan boil the strawberries, sugar and lemon juice until they break down and the syrup thickens. Remove from the heat, blitz with a stick blender. Pour most of the pureed strawberry mixture over the top of the sponge layers pushing the into the holes, reserving some for decoration.
4. To make the buttercream; place the butter, icing sugar, double cream & vanilla into a large bowl and beat with an electric whisk until smooth, light & fluffy. Remove the sponge layers from their tins and layer them up with the spreading buttercream between each layer. Coat the cake using the remaining buttercream. Place the cake in the fridge while you make the drip.
5. Stir the oil into the melted chocolate and using a teaspoon, tease the chocolate over the edge of the cake until it forms a drip - continue all the way round before filling the centre and smoothing.
6. Place back in the fridge for the chocolate to set before drizzling with the leftover strawberry puree.   Recipe by Daniel Harding

Top tips for making Halloween drip cake:

One thing to keep in mind when dripping the ganache is that you should try to scrape the bottom of your spoon against the bowl each time you go to get more. This will help with 'dripping' the icing as it won't be too thick and blobby. Plus no rogue bits will fly off on other parts of your cake.

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