How to Make Chocolate Leaves...

I recently made a Chocolate Pumpkin Cake which had a striking orange frosting...it did however still look a little plain when it was finished. So I decided to add an Autumnal touch by making some chocolate leaves.

Chocolate leaves were actually a lot easier to make than I thought. I used rose leaves which have a nice veining to them and are also non-toxic. Other popular leaves for this use are bay, lemon or camellia.

The first job is to thoroughly wash the leaves. I used a little soapy water and then patted the leaves dry using kitchen towel. Some other methods suggest you can just wipe your leaves with a damp kitchen cloth.

I then melted down my chocolates - white, milk and dark in separate bowls on top of simmering saucepans of water. You could also use a microwave for this. I'm not a chocolate expert and did not temper my chocolate...I simply melted it and it worked for me.

Next take a brush designed for cake decorating or use with edible products...or a pastry brush and liberally cover the BACK of each leaf with chocolate. The easiest way to do this is by picking each leaf up individually by the stem...it gets rather messy if you leave the leaf on the baking paper as you can see below...it took me a little while to realise this! By painting the back of the leaf it gives a more defined vein pattern. Once the leaf is painted place it on a baking tray covered in baking paper.

Put a good coating of chocolate on the leaf but take care not to get it on the other side as this makes it a lot more difficult to peel the leaf away when the chocolate is set. Once all the leaves are coated leave to set. I actually put mine in the feezer briefly...again this is probably frowned upon but it worked for me...but don't quote me on it!

When the chocolate is set peel away the leaves and discard. You may need to do this fairly quickly as I found a few of the leaves melted as I held on to them.

Finally, if you wish to add a final glamorous touch to your leaves then you can add a little gold edible lustre dust or spary. This sets the leaves off really well if placed on a chocolate cake as they then stand out against the brown.

Interestingly after I'd made my leaves I also found instructions for chocolate leaves in the latest Great British Bake Off book 'Showstoppers'. It's on p.275 and the book also provides information on tempering chocolate. These were pretty easy to make and provide a really pretty decoration. I'll definitely make them again in the future!

Chocolate Pumpkin Halloween Cake

This Chocolate Pumpkin Cake is my entry into this month's Calendar Cakes...and no surprises for guessing that the theme is Halloween! I was quite intrigued by a cake with pumpkin puree in as I've never baked with pumpkin before so I thought I'd give it a go.

The recipe for this cake also includes nutmeg, cinnamon, buttermilk and soft dark brown sugar, so overall along with the pumpkin the resulting cake was really moist. It also wasn't overly chocolately and the nutmeg and cinnamon gave it a nice warm flavour. It was slightly reminiscent of a ginger cake.

I used tinned pumpkin puree which you can get from Waitrose or even Amazon if you can't find it in the supermarket. If you've got the time or inclination you can also make your own pumpkin puree using a recipe such as this one.

Inbetween the cake layers is a tasty orange cream cheese frosting, you can find the recipe here. I really like the frosting and would certainly consider using it with other cakes. To make sure my cake wasn't wonky I also levelled the two bottom layers using a cake leveller which you can see above.

To finish off the cake I made some chocolate leaves which you can see in the second picture. They provided nice decoration and also added to the autumnal feel of the cake. The recipe for the cake and frosting can be found on the Country Living website.

If you're making a Halloween bake in the next couple of days then we'd love for you to enter it into our Calendar Cakes challenge. Calendar Cakes is hosted jointly here at Laura Loves Cakes and also by Rachel over at Dolly Bakes. Rachel is hosting this month so check out the details here.

 

I'm also entering this cake into The One Ingredient Challenge hosted this month by Nazima at Franglais Kitchen and alternately by Laura at How to Cook Good Food . The ingredient this month is pumpkin and squash.

Finally, I'm also entering into Simple and in Season which is hosted by Fabulicious Food and the guest host this month is also Nazima at Franglais Kitchen.