Winter Berry Sensation

This my first ever Winter Berry cake! I hope you enjoy. The base ingredients and method is from a BBC Black Forest gateau recipe. And I've made Gf !

Cooking time= 40mins

Serves= 8-10

Level= Easy

Ingredients

For the cake For filling and top

175g Salted butter A generous drizzle of Tia Maria (or a berry liqueur)

200g Dark Chocolate 100g Any cherry or berry jam you like

300g GF Plain Flour 450ml Double cream

375g Caster sugar 3 tbsp Icing sugar

25g Cocoa powder Any fresh berry (I chose blackberries and raspberries)

1 tsp Bicarbonate of soda

Half a teaspoon of Xanthan Gum

2 Eggs

200g Plain yoghurt

Method

1. Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Grease and line the base of 3 x 20cm cake tins (ideally with loose bottoms.)

Put the butter and 75g chocolate broken into chunks in a small pan and gently heat, stirring, until completely melted.

2. Mix together the flour, sugar, cocoa, bicarbonate of soda and xanthan gum with a pinch of salt in a mixing bowl. Whisk the eggs and yogurt together. Scrape the melted chocolate mixture and egg mixture into the dry ingredients, mix until the batter is lump free.

3. Divide the mixture between the tins and bake for 25 mins once ready, to test they're done push in a skewer and check that it comes out clean.

4. Prick the cakes a few times with a skewer and gently pour the Tia Maria over all the sponges and let it soak in.

5. Heat your jam in the microwave. Tip 200ml of the cream into a small pan and heat until just below simmering point. Chop the remaining chocolate and pour over the hot cream and stir until melted. Set aside until spreadable.

6. When the cakes are cool whisk the remaining cream and the icing sugar together until softly whipped. Then spread your jam over the 2 of the cakes and then add on your cream and icing sugar mix. Stack the cakes on top of each other and spread the chocolate cream over the third cake and sit on top of the other cakes. Put the fresh berries around the cake and serve !