Rum'n'raisin cocoa cake
June 7, 2015 Michael's birthday was barely half elapsed before he got on his plane to Munich , so we agreed that I'd have a celebratory cake ready for him when he returned home. Michael had picked out the rum'n'raisin recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World and I offered to pump it up with a bit of cocoa. Instead of forming a dozen cupcakes, I poured the batter into a single round cake tin and baked it a little longer. It makes for a damp cake with a fluffy crumb and deep flavour - it has the dark caramel sweetness and only a little of the sharp booziness of dark rum. While I'm not especially fond of dried fruits in cake, the rum-soaked raisins dotted through this one are happy bursts of tripled sweetness. A soaked-in glaze and slathering of buttercream layer but don't belabour the rum flavouring; I also added a ring of dark chocolate chips to the top to extend the cocoa theme. We ate this cake with cups of vanilla-scented black tea, and everyone went ba...