Two yummy festive cakes

Chocolate and cherry cake

Frangourou Christmas log

Two gorgeous and easy cakes for festive celebrations!

The first is a chocolate and cherry cake I've adapted from a Black Forest style, the second an adaptation of the traditional French Christmas log--a cake I make every year for the family Christmas lunch. Both are easy--the log particularly so, as it does not even require any baking--and super delicious of course!

Chocolate and cherry cake
150 g dark cooking chocolate
150 g castor sugar
150 g unsalted butter
3 heaped tablespoons self raising flour, sifted
5 eggs
pinch salt

Melt the chocolate in a pan over low heat(add a little water first to stop it from sticking). Still over low heat, stir in the sugar. When all sugar mixed in, take pan off heat and cut the butter into small pieces. Put pan back on heat and stir in the butter a little at a time. Now slowly add in the flour, stirring constantly, and continue stirring even when mixed in, till it begins to thicken. Take pan off heat. Heat oven to 180 C, and get a round cake tin ready, buttering the bottom and sides and dusting with flour, or using baking paper.
Separate the eggs one by one--put the egg whites in a bowl, but add each egg yolk to the chocolate mix and stir in. When all egg yolks are used up, beat the egg whites till stiff, adding the pinch of salt, and fold into the cake mix. Put mixture into the tin and bake for about 40--45 mins. (Test if cooked by inserting knife into mix after about 40 mins)
Make a coating for the cake of more melted dark chocolate(I actually used Lindt's dark chocolate with orange pieces, delicious!) -You melt the chocolate over low heat with around 25 g of unsalted butter, a tablespoon of full cream and a tablespoon of icing sugar. Coat the cake with it when it's cold, and add halved sweet black cherries as decoration. Serve with whipped cream and/or icecream.

Super easy, super delicious frangourou Christmas Log cake(requires no baking, can be made Christmas Eve).
This was my mother's invention, we had it every Christmas when we were kids, and I still make it every Christmas.
Ingredients:
1 packet sponge finger biscuits
200 g unsalted butter, melted
1 or 2 eggs(depending on how much mixture you have)
half to 3/4 cup hot strong sweet coffee(a good instant coffee works fine)
Cooking chocolate, melted with a little cream.
Crush all the biscuits, add the hot sweet coffee, the melted butter, and mix well. Add the slightly beaten egg(or two). You need to obtain a good stiff mix that you can easily shape into a log. That's what you do then--shape it into a log, and then put it in fridge till it is set. Meanwhile melt the chocolate over a low heat with a little cream, stir till all melted and glossy. Spread over the cake, on the top and sides. Put in fridge to set overnight. You can also decorate the top with angelica leaves, almonds, rose petals, sugar holly, whatever you feel like!

To everyone I wish a wonderful Christmas, Hanukkah, and every other seasonal festivity, and a happy New Year. See you in 2015. A bientôt!