(Double) Rainbow Malt Cake

Double rainbow all the way across the sky!

I think this may be my favourite cake of all time. I will use any excuse to whip up a fun cake, and a friend leaving my work was definitely a very good reason. For those of you unfamiliar with the double rainbow meme that took the internet by storm not too long ago, it all started with this video of a guy tripping out over a double rainbow, which went viral and spawned awesome remixes like the double rainbow song which is even more hilarious than the original video and scarily catchy. You can read more about it here. After finding out about it through Suze & Billy, I had the song stuck in my head and then infected all my friends at work with it. They totally hated me for a couple of days there, hahaha.

Wowow Omigawwwd...

So what's in this crazy cake? Well I've been seeing a lot of gorgeous Malteser cakes on other blogs recently and was keen to try it out. And then I thought, what if I replace the maltesers with crispy m&ms, the dark chocolate ganache with white chocolate and decorate it like rainbow...a double rainbow? OMIGAWD. I practically ran home to make it. I thought about using Nigella Lawson's recipe but ended up adapting Poires au Chocolat's gorgeous looking recipe. The cake is flavoured with Horlicks (unfortunately I had to use Ovaltine which made it look a bit darker) and has a beautiful rich, malty flavour.

So intense...

About 5 packets of crispy m&ms went into these cakes, I'm not sure if they're readily available everywhere but for those who dont know, they are just m&ms with a tiny crispy malt centre, which I thought was the perfect colourful substitute for the maltesers. It was a pain to separate all the m&ms into their different colours, but totally worth it! I thought the cakes looked a little plain on their own and was kicking myself for not getting some white marshmallows to use as clouds on the bottom. But I had something even better - vanilla persian fairy floss to make perfect fluffy clouds!

What does this mean??

Of course my silly captions will make no sense to anyone who hasn't seen the internet meme but as a standalone cake it's still great! I think kids would totally love it. You could probably even try replacing the horlicks with milo if you wanted a more chocolatey flavour. And we know how awesome milo tastes in cake. I reduced the sugar in the cake since the white chocolate ganache is a fair bit sweeter that dark chocolate. I was sooooooooo close to splitting my ganache while I was whipping it so it's slightly grainier than I wanted. But still good.

Heehee this cake just makes me grin from ear to ear. It's so colourful and fun. If you can't get your hands on crispy m&ms I'm sure regular ones will do, but the crispy ones are the best to match the malt flavour of the cake. I made the cake one night and then made the icing and decorated it the night after, so it was really easy and not too time consuming. However I would probably recommend icing the cake on the same day you bake it, I found my cake went a bit hard from being in the fridge on its own overnight.

I only wish I had one of those chiffon cake tins (like a flat bottom bundt tin) so that I could haved baked the cake with a hole in the centre rather than cutting out the centre. If I had been less lazy I would have used the leftover m&ms and ganache and made mini rainbow cakes out of the centre piece. Most fun cake ever ♥!!!

Double Rainbow Malt Cake
(adapted from Poires au Chocolat's Malteser Layer Cake)
195g self-raising flour
195g butter, room temperature
150g caster sugar
105g Horlicks (or Ovaltine)
1 tsp baking powder
3 eggs
60ml milk
60ml boiling water

300g white chocolate
300ml pouring cream
5-6 packets of crispy m&ms (can be replaced with regular or maltesers)
Optional: Marshmallows or persian fairy floss (pashmak) for cloud decoration (available from gourmet supermarkets)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C. Grease and line the bottom of a 20cm round springform tin (you can also use a chiffon cake tin or bundt pan if you don't want to waste the middle). Cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Sift flour, baking powder and Horlicks together and then fold gently into the mixture until nearly combined. Add milk and fold again, then add water and fold once more. Quickly spoon mixture into cake tin and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Remove and cool in tin for 10 minutes, then place on a wire rack to cool completely.

Break the chocolate up into small pieces and put into a bowl. Heat the cream then pour over the chocolate. Leave for a few minutes and then mix in. Chill until it just reaches below room temperature and then beat with an electric mixer on medium speed until it thickens and holds its shape (take care not to over beat or mixture will split, if it does, reheat mixture until it melts and then whip again). I've found that it's too easy to split the white chocolate ganache, so I'd probably recommend just chilling the ganache in the fridge until it's thick but still pourable, if it runs off the surface too easily then it is not cool enough.

Cut a circle out of the centre of the cake using an 7-8cm round cutter and cut the cake in half to form the rainbow shapes. Using a spatula or palette knife, spread ganache over the cakes, covering completely. While icing is still sticky, arrange m&ms over the top of the ganache. Chill for 10 minutes before serving. Can be stored overnight in the fridge.

SO BRIGHT, SO VIVID...