Easily the recipe I’ve been asked about the most. The one on telly didn’t have the brandy in because I didn’t want Jake to explode…

  1. Break about 250g dark chocolate (at least 70% cocoa) into small chunks in a large pyrex bowl. Spoon in 2tbsp of golden syrup and fold in about a quarter of a 568ml carton of double cream.
  2. Stand the bowl over (not in) a large-based pan of hot water over a low heat and leave until the chocolate has melted, and add in 2tsp of brandy (this needs mixing in quickly or it’ll curdle). Remove the bowl from the pan and stir again so it’s silky smooth. Leave to cool but do not refrigerate!
  3. Line your cake tin (an 8″ size is perfect) with greaseproof paper – you can do this while you are waiting for the chocolate to cool. I used a spring-loaded cake tin which made it a lot easier to get the torte out afterwards. Remember it’ll take the shape of the tin, wrinkles and all.
  4. Pour the rest of the cream into a very large bowl and add a teaspoon of ground cinnamon. Whip until the cream will stand in soft peaks which disappear after about 1-2s.
  5. Fold the cream and chocolate mix together by pouring the chocolate into the cream, then use a whisk on a slow setting to beat it together properly.
  6. Pour it all into the tin and level the surface with the back of the spoon. Put the tin in the fridge and leave to firm up – you can get away with doing this in 2h but I prefer to leave it overnight.
  7. Before you serve, dust with cocoa on the top.
  8. Unclip and remove the side of the tin and remove the greaseproof. Slice and arrange and serve. Nom!

This serves about 8 portions because it’s so rich, and goes really well with fresh raspberries and vanilla ice-cream (which is how I served it on the show). The camera crew had quite a bit later on in the week 🙂