Mother's Day Marble Loaf
A simple marble loaf recipe made with 100% cocoa powder, and finished with a glossy chocolate ganache – perfect for Mother's Day!
Ingredients
For the cake
- 175 g unsalted butter
- 275 g caster sugar
- 3 large eggs beaten
- 300 g plain flour sifted
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 175 g sour cream
- 3 tbsp Menier 100% Cocoa Powder sifted
- 1 tbsp full fat / whole milk
- Pinch fine sea salt
For the ganache
- 100 g Menier 53% Cocoa Dark Chocolate Drops
- 100 ml double cream
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 180C/fan 160C/350F. Lightly butter a 900g loaf tin and line the bottom and sides of the tin with baking parchment.
- Put the butter and sugar into a large bowl and use an electric mixer to cream together for 5 minutes or until light and fluffy.
- Add the eggs in thirds, mixing until completely combined before adding more.
- Meanwhile, sift the flour, baking powder and a pinch of salt in a large bowl. Once all the eggs are combined, add the flour mixture in three additions, alternating with the soured cream. Mix until you have a smooth batter and everything is nicely incorporated.
- Divide the batter equally into two bowls, then sift the 3tbsp of cocoa powder into one bowl. Add the 1tbsp of milk to the same bowl and beat together until smooth and combined.
- Fill two piping bags with the two batters then pipe into your prepared tin, alternating the stripes both horizontally and vertically until you've used up all of the batter. Lightly tap the tin on your work surface to get rid of any air pockets, then use a chopstick, knife or skewer to swirl the two batters together. Be gentle and go easy as you still want a distinction between the two flavours.
- Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean, or with a few small crumbs clinging to it. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tin for 15 minutes before lifting out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
- In the meantime, make your ganache. Put your chocolate into a heatproof bowl big enough to sit on top of a saucepan filled with a few inches of water. Bring to the boil, making sure the water doesn't touch the bottom of the bowl, stirring the chocolate at all times until completely melted.
- In a separate saucepan, bring your cream to a gentle simmer over a low heat.N.B. You don't want your cream to boil or bubble!
- Once the cream is steaming and there's a gentle simmer, take it off the heat immediately and pour it over the chocolate, whisking constantly to create a stiff but glossy ganache. Leave for 30 secs - 1 min to cool slightly before pouring it over the loaf cake, allowing any excess to drop down the sides. Use an offset spatula to spread the ganache over the top of the cake then leave to set.
- Slice and serve with a cup of tea.