– I’m Darren McGrady, the Royal Chef, former chef to the Queen, Princess Diana, Prince William and Prince Harry, and I’m gonna be making the Queen’s favorite Chocolate Birthday Cake. (exciting orchestral music) The Chocolate Birthday Cake is a recipe that dates back to Queen Victoria. It’s a family recipe.
We start off with eggs and sugar, we make a sabayon. And then into that we’re going to add some flour, and some butter, and some cocoa powder, mix it all together, goes in the oven, and then we’ll sandwich layer that with some chocolate ganache. The Queen’s a chocoholic. She loves chocolate.
Anything on the menu that we used to prepare at the palace that had chocolate in, she’d always approve and it would go to the royal table. Right now the eggs and the sugar are mixed together, and you can see they’re really sort of thick and gooey.
When we put them on the stove over a pan of hot water, we’ll keep whisking them until the eggs break. And by breaking I mean the consistency of the liquid here just actually turns to water. So right now you can see it’s really thick and gooey.
The Chocolate Birthday Cake is a cake that the Queen has every year for her birthday. I say her birthday, she actually has two birthdays a year. She’s a lucky queen. April the 21st is her actual birthday, but then the second Saturday in June is her official birthday.
So this year she’ll be 94 or 188. When I started at Buckingham Palace, this cake was made for every single member of the royal family’s birthday. The Chocolate Genoise Birthday Cake with the ganache all over the top and through the center. Everyone had the same recipe, everyone had the same cake.
And it wasn’t until later on when I read a book by Gabriel Tschumi, who was chef to Queen Victoria, that I found out that he made this same cake. He created the recipe over 100 years ago. So the eggs have almost broken. Look, when I lift now, they break.
And just a little bit longer, and then they’ll be perfect to put on the machine, and then they’ll increase in volume at least two or three times. But be careful at this stage that you don’t overcook them. Because any longer than this stage right now, you’ll end up with scrambled eggs with sugar, and that is nasty.
Perfect. So now it goes onto the machine, and the volume will increase. So next stage is to put the flour and the cocoa together and then start sieving away to make sure there are no lumps in there. I don’t know anyone that’s had the same birthday cake, the same recipe every year.
But the Queen’s always had this Chocolate Birthday Cake. I don’t know if she loves it, if she loves the chocolate cake, or maybe it’s just because she grew up with it, and maybe it’s a tradition that they have the same chocolate cake.
So for the 11 years that I was in the kitchens there, it would be the same chocolate cake 22 times. So now the butter. (orchestral music) And the flour and chocolate. You could put a spoon in there, but this is the best way to mix this in, by hand. I’ve been told I got hands like Shrek.
They’re perfect for mixing in this chocolate mix. I can’t even remember how many times I’ve made this chocolate cake. Not once have I ever thought about changing the recipe, making it slightly different, making it my own. This is a royal family tradition, and if this was good enough for Queen Victoria and her chef, it’s good enough for me too.
To the oven. (orchestral music) Once the cake’s in the oven, then we start making the filling and the topping. The filling, chocolate ganache. And you melt the chocolate, and here’ on the stove I’ve got some cream that I’m gonna bring to the boil.
Once the cream’s come to the boil, I’ll pour that over the chocolate and start whisking it in until it’s all smooth and creamy. There are two favorite chocolate cakes at Buckingham Palace. This one, the Chocolate Birthday Cake, and also the Chocolate Biscuit Cake.
Now Prince William chose the Chocolate Biscuit Cake, which is in my book, “Eating Royally,” as his groom’s cake when he got married. That was one of the Queen’s favorite chocolate cakes that she eats all through the year. The Chocolate Cake is different.
The Chocolate Cake is used as the birthday cake, so every member of the royal family, when they have their birthdays, they’ll have the same Chocolate Cake, even at Christmas. At Christmas, with all of that chocolate on the table, all through the day, Princess Alexandra, it was her birthday, December the 25th.
So alongside the chocolate Buche de Noel, and all the little chocolate candies and everything, would be a Chocolate Birthday Cake. Once the chocolate’s melted, and the cream’s come to the boil, you can slowly start whisking this together.
Once you’ve got a nice creamy chocolate sauce, then it needs to refrigerate until it’s set up. Once it’s firm enough to spread between the layers, we can take that out, and then create all the layers. (orchestral music) The cake’s been in the oven now for about 35 minutes. It’s nice and firm to the touch.
And so this is ready to turn out. I just run a spatula around the edge. (orchestral music) And then I can take this and invert it onto a cooling wire. And take off the parchment paper on the bottom. Once the ganache is chilled, about an hour, two hours, you can leave it overnight. It’s much easier to work with for the filling.
You can see it’s started to thicken, and the cake’s chilled. So now we can take this, turn it upside down, and then slice our layers. When we’re slicing the layers, rather than cut all the way through, you tend to come out this end and tear the whole sponge. So it’s actually better to slice in and keep turning the cake as you go.
Now I’ve got my three even layers, I can take some ganache and put some on each one. (happy orchestral music) So now I start building the layers. Piece of sponge, chocolate ganache, more sponge, more ganache, and then finally the lid on the top. And then we push that down so it’s nice and flat and nice and smooth.
We’re going to take the sponge and put it onto a wire rack. If there wasn’t enough chocolate in the cake already, we now make more chocolate ganache, boil more cream, melt more chocolate, whisk it all together, and so we’ve got a nice smooth, runny topping for this cake.
Then it’s all about pouring it over the top and getting it even, and getting it perfect. (orchestral music) As you can see, it’s quite a large cake. And you’d think the Queen was inviting all the family over to celebrate her birthday. But in reality, that doesn’t happen.
Most of the time the Queen celebrates on her own, or with Prince Philip, or just with a Lady in Waiting, or a friend. Look at all that gorgeous chocolate. Through the sponge, in the layers, and now all over the top too. But if you think that’s all the chocolate that’s going in there, we’ve got more to put on the top. Let’s refrigerate this, and then we’ll decorate it.
As I said, the Queen loves chocolate. Chocolate would appear on the menu all the time, whether it was the Chocolate Perfection Pie, another one of her favorite dishes, one of her favorite desserts. The other royals, maybe not so much. Prince Philip, he actually quite enjoyed cheese instead of dessert.
The Prince of Wales liked the lighter dishes. Lemons and figs, and anything like that in the dishes. William and Harry, when I cooked for them young boys, they liked the Caramel Banana Cake. And of course, Kate loved the Sticky Toffee Pudding.
As you can see, it’s refrigerated for about 30 minutes, just to set the chocolate up. It goes a little bit darker, but it already smells so good. And the other chocolate ganache, I put that in the refrigerator too, so I’m gonna get that, and put it into a little piping bag to decorate the top.
We’re going to transfer it to this cake board. (orchestral music) So carefully have to lift this off. (orchestral music) I’m gonna put into the bag. (bag crinkling) And then it’s just decorating the cake. Start off at the top. And chocolate on the top is not enough.
We need chocolate around the base as well. It’s a real Chocolate Birthday Cake. All that’s left to do is wish the Queen Happy Birthday. A little plaque made from chocolate on the top. Happy Birthday, Your Majesty.
What always surprised me was that we never put candles on the cake, and we never wrote, Happy Birthday Your Majesty, Happy Birthday Queenie, Happy Birthday Liz. We just wrote Happy Birthday on there. That’s how I prepared it for 11 years at Buckingham Palace. Time to taste it.
I’ve got to decide if I’m doing a slice for me, or the slice that the Queen would take. Because the Queen only takes a really, really small slice. And it would take her all week to eat through this cake. And then there’d still be some left to send down to the servants, down to the staff dining room. She would only take a tiny slice of cake, like this.
Oh, chocolate, chocolate, chocolate, and more chocolate! It smells so good. That dark chocolate, that light, fluffy sponge. Happy Birthday, Your Majesty.
