Seville orange marmalade and chocolate cake

With my veg patch bare, I turn to the marmalade cupboard for seasonal inspiration and a celebration cake that's part Jaffa cake, part Terry's chocolate orange.

Look, I’ll be honest, there’s nothing to eat.

The veg patch is empty. It’s very neat though. I’ve just shovelled a load of topsoil from one raised bed which is being removed to make way for a greenhouse (more of which later) onto the other beds, so it all looks tidy and full of promise. But that’s all there is right now. And promise won’t keep us in decent meals.

Still, there’s always something in season somewhere.

And my stash of Seville oranges, which are in season until roughly the end of February and which I bought from Natoora via Ocado, has been turned into marmalade (using the Riverford recipe I use every year) and is currently preoccupying me with finding ways to enjoy it’s bittersweet charms short of eating with a spoon.

So, a cake.

A rather ridiculous one. I don’t generally go in for Bake Off style faff with cakes, preferring to bung it in a cake tin and focus on flavour rather than whizzy decorations. But a celebration cake was needed this week, for special people who like Jaffa cakes and Terry’s chocolate oranges, and so the stars aligned on this chocolate and marmalade cake.

Shot in the wild - at the celebration and surrounded by greedy hoards - so apologies for the dreadful styling

Seville orange marmalade and chocolate cake

I’ve gone full faff of five layers in this version (which leaves a layer spare for the chef - see below). But you could easily halve the quantities and make two thicker layers, flavouring one with orange and the other which chocolate, then sandwich them together with marmalade and have done with it. If you want to do the full five layers but only have two tins, that’s fine: the chocolate batter will hold just long enough for you to bake the first two cakes then de-tin them and reuse one.

I’ve added ground almond to a basic sponge to give a more moist, pudding-y texture and it’s so successful I think I’ll do it to all my sponge cakes from now on.

Finally, the decoration. The buttercream should be applied in just a thin layer lest it overpowers the bitter orange flavours with sickly sweetness (kiddie cupcake this is not). And the melted chocolate is essential to me. That crack of set chocolate giving way to soft crumb is the defining feature of Jaffa cakes and adds texture to the cake. Don’t worry if you can’t muster the energy to temper it, the snap won’t be as pleasingly clean and the colour will be a little duller, but Prue Leith isn’t watching.

On your marks. Get set. Bake.

Serves 10-12 messily