Melt in the middle chocolate orange pudding

In a bizarre twist of fate, Liza Minelli led to the creation of this yummy and ever so indulgent pudding.
While this may sound bizarre- it’s true.
My friends and I had tickets to see Liza on the London stage yesterday. Three of us had even flown in for the occasion.  You can imagine how gutted we were that the gig was cancelled- we were devastated.

To make up for our loss and to try to create a Liza inspired event that we could all enjoy, my friend Rachel and I decided to host a Liza Sunday luncheon for us all to enjoy.  We cooked a three course meal along with lashings of Prosecco and watched Cabaret, Liza in concert and Stepping out.  What a laugh!

I was looking for a different dessert and something completely decadent that would suit a diva inspired afternoon.    I trawled the internet and found this on the BBC good food page.  I knew it would be perfect as our friends Maire and Kathryn love a chocolate and orange flavour combination and Rachel, Molly, Sheena and just love pudding!

It looked very odd going into the oven and I really wasn’t convinced that it would work but I have to say it was delicious,  If you want to give it a go (and you really should) here is what you will need
Ingredients

• 100g butter
• 250g self-raising flour
• 140g caster sugar
• 50g cocoa
• pinch of salt
• 1 tsp baking powder
• zest and juice 1 orange
• 3 eggs
• 150ml milk
• 100g orange milk chocolate or milk chocolate, chopped (we used Terry’s chocolate orange)

For the sauce

• 300 mls boiling water
• 200g light muscovado sugar
• 25g cocoa

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 180C
• Grease a dish
• place the flour caster sugar, cocoa, baking powder, salt and orange zest in a bowl and mix well
• beat together the melted butter, orange juice, eggs and milk

• Stir into the dry mix and ensure it is well mixed
• Stir in the chocolate chunks and pour into the greased dish

• mix the boiling water with the muscavado sugar and cocoa and pour over the mix in the dish

• place in the oven and bake for around 30 minutes
• The top will be cooked but when served there will be a delicious sauce in the bottom