Chocolate Orange Jaffa Cake – extra moist and delicious cake with two unusual ingredients.
Chocolate Orange Jaffa Cake is another dessert from my mother’s cookbook. It was both popular and a little bit unusual.
There are two not so ordinary things about this cake. First, according to the original recipe, you were supposed to peel and freeze two oranges. When completely frozen, oranges were supposed to be grated using hand grater. I was wondering what was the reason for this step and came to conclusion that it was because in those days blenders were not very popular and almost noone had them (at least in my country). The only way to make orange pulp was to freeze and grate oranges by hand. This time I skipped this step and blended the orange together with syrup which gave me exactly the same taste as the original recipe.
Second, there is and egg in the chocolate frosting. You don’t see that often in recipes. It does make the frosting extra creamy and I happen to like it. I know some people are going to be sceptical about it, so I suggest they substitute the egg in the frosting with 3 Tbsp whipping cream. I believe the effect should be fairly similar.
The syrup, the orange pulp and the creamy frosting together make this Chocolate Orange Jaffa Cake extra moist and delicious.

- 6 eggs
- 30 Tbsp (or 2 cups + 4 Tbs) milk
- 30 Tbsp (or 2 cups + 4 Tbs) sugar
- 30 Tbsp (or 2 cups + 4 Tbs) flour
- 3 tsp baking powder
- 200 ml (2/3 cup + 2 1/2 Tbs) water or orange juice
- 2/3 cup + 2 1/2 Tbsp sugar
- 2 Tbsp jam (apricot or orange or tangerine)
- 2 large oranges, peeled and pips removed
- 70 g (2.5 oz ) dark chocolate (about 45% cocoa)
- 70 g (2.5 oz or 1/3 cup) sugar
- 70 g (2.5 oz or 1/3 cup) butter or margarine
- 1 egg (or 3 Tbsp whipping cream)
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CAKE: Mix all ingredients briefly. Pour into 8x10 inch oiled and buttered baking pan. Bake at 175 C (350 F) for about 40 minutes or until skewer inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean and the top of the cake is golden brown.
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Let cake cool to room temperature. Cut the cake in half. Crumble upper half into a bowl.
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SYRUP: While cake is baking, cook water (or orange juice) and sugar until sugar is dissolved. Blend together (using regular blender or handheld blender) with oranges and jam. Pour the mixture over crumbled cake. Stir to combine and transfer into the pan over bottom half of the cake.
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CHOCOLATE FROSTING: Put chocolate, sugar and butter in a double boiler and melt. Add the egg (or whipping cream) and mix until it thickens and reaches temperature of 80 C (175 F). Pour over cake.
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If you stir 2 whole oranges which have just been peeled and the pits removed, into the syrup, then pour this over the cake you are going to have oranges sitting on top of a cake. This just doesn’t work. .
she said blend, as in, use a blender
You add the orange mixture to the crumbled cake and reassemble. Read all the instructions before giving a 1-star review.
Hooked ! This is one of those retro evergreen desserts ! Simple ingredients usually give the best dishes ! Thank you !
Hello – Dumb Male here ……….. what becomes of the JAM in the syrup ?
Presumably it is blended in as well ……… ?
Yes, jam is blended together with syrup and oranges.
I’m not sure about the crumbled cake. There are no instructions as to how much of the cake is crumbled or how you crumble it. After it is baked and you pull it out of the oven, what do you do to crumble it?
Never mind. Found it. 😀
Curious as to why measurements have been given in tablespoon amounts. Who is going to measure out 30 tablespoons of something when a cup measure is so much faster. Is there a reason?
I’m not leaving a rating yet as I haven’t made the cake. This is the sort of recipe that would be helpful to have a video of the technique. It looks delicious though.