Baking: Oreo Cookie Chocolate Cake

Good news is, I quite like baking.

Bad news is, I quite like eating what I bake. 

Really bad news is that I ate far too much of this! 

This goes completely against my training for Kilimanjaro, but it was my best friend's birthday and it was an occasion for a totally awesome cake (if I do say so myself!) 

I kind of swapped and changed a few details from the classic Hummingbird Cafe's cupcake recipe and this is how it turned out! 

Ingredients

For the cake:

120g plain flour

140g caster sugar

1 ½ tsp baking powder

a pinch of salt

40g unsalted butter, at room temperature

120ml whole milk

1 egg

¼tsp vanilla extract

For the oreo cookie frosting:

125g icing sugar, sifted

40g unsalted butter, at room temperature

15ml whole milk

Around 6 mushed up Oreo cookies

For the white chocolate frosting:

250g icing sugar, sifted

80g  unsalted butter, at room temperature

15ml whole milk

150g white chocolate melted

Method

For the cake:

1. The original recipe says preheat the oven to 170°C (325°F) Gas 3. Mine needed to be slightly higher as it's not fan assisted. 
2. Put the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and butter in a freestanding electric mixer with a paddle attachment (or I used a handheld electric whisk) and beat on slow speed until you get a sandy consistency and everything is combined. Gradually pour in half the milk and beat until the milk is just incorporated.
3. Whisk the egg, vanilla extract and remaining milk together in a separate bowl for a few seconds, then pour into the flour mixture and continue beating until just incorporated. Continue mixing for a couple more minutes until the mixture is smooth. 
4. Pour into a greased cake tin and bake for about 20-25minutes. 
5. A skewer inserted in the centre should come out clean. Leave the cake to cool slightly in the tray before turning out onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
6. Repeat all over again because there are two layers to this cake baby! (of course if you are really organised, you can double up the measurements and bake the two layers at the same time in two tins. I'm not at that baking stage clearly!)

For the oreo frosting:

1. Beat the icing sugar and butter together with an electric mixer on medium-slow speed until the mixture comes together and is well mixed.
2. Turn the mixer down to slow speed. Combine the milk and vanilla extract in a separate bowl, then add to the butter mixture a couple of tablespoons at a time. I used a little bit less than the 25ml.  Then, turn the mixer up to high speed.
3. Crush some Oreo cookies, big chunks are fine, the blender will do some hard work for you and add the crushed bickies to the frosting!
4. Continue beating until the frosting is light and fluffy, at least 5 minutes. The longer the frosting is beaten, the fluffier and lighter it becomes! 
5. Smooth onto the top of one of the cakes, and place the other on top to create the amazing chocolatey layers! 

For the white chocolate frosting: 

Do the exact same thing as above, except add the melted chocolate in instead of the Oreo cookies! And cover the cake, no need to be pretty about it! Just lash it on! 

Finally, crush a couple of more cookies and sprinkle them on top for decoration! 

Enjoy!