Save the sighs.  It was good and I bet you wish you were here to have some too.  Actually, I wish that you were here right now.
Here's why...

D and I have a good relationship.  We've been together for a lot of years and we're happy to have had them.  yeah, there've been downs.  That's normal.  Times when we've wanted to throw in the towel, forget it all happened, shake hands and walk away... but we didn't.  Having weathered enough crap between the two of us and with life in general we can both honestly confess our good fortune at spending this time together.
Tomorrow is D's birthday.  It's not a big one - no big landmarks, 'Oh jeez, I can't believe you're that old' or 'You know, I always thought that by the time I got this old that I would be on my way out' or anything like that.  It's just a birthday.
What's making this birthday a little extra special and/or odd is that D will be on a plane.  He's going to Burkina Faso for about 18 days give or take.  I'm not so sure that being on a plane is like being at a restaurant on your birthday.  I'm kinda skeptical that the air host's (or whatever you call them) will be convening by D's seat to sing him a birthday song and present him with a cupcake and candle.  So I'm making sure that we send him off with something before his birthday.  It's only the night before so at least it's close.  I'm gonna make him something slightly more up his alley once he's back and can enjoy it for a couple of days.  For now this simple chocolate cake with simple chocolate icing is just the thing.  That's all the upside.
The downside is that I'm all alone with two kids for the next 18 days give or take and concert season is just kicking off for this household and birthday month has descended and work continues right up to the 23rd and then it's this big holiday that everyone kinda freaks out about.  I'm not feeling sorry for myself but I'll definitely miss him.


I guess that this cake is both a birthday and a goodbye thing... a little send off.
On a side note: I'm not going to bitch for long about this but this whole 'dark-by-4:15-p.m.-thing' is getting a bit old for me.  I'm pretty dang tired of making something when I come home from work and by the time I'm ready for pictures it's too dark to get a decent shot.  I'll be damned if I'm going to set up a light-box and get into all that.  I must keep telling myself that in another 6 - 8 weeks things will already feel a little different 'cause we're almost at the solstice, right?  For now please excuse the crappy shots and try to enjoy the spirit of the evening with us.


Chocolate Mud Cake adapted from Delicious Magazine (UK)
makes 1 9 inch round cake
(I'll try to give accurate equivalents here but it's not exact)

250g (1 cup) unsalted butter, cubed
200g dark chocolate, chopped
1 tbsp espresso powder
100 ml milk
250g (about 2 cups or just a little less) self raising flour (you can make your own)
40g (a little less than a half cup) dark cocoa
250g (about 1 cup) sugar
4 lg eggs beaten
1 tsp vanilla
150 ml sour cream

Icing:

1 1/2 cups icing sugar
3/4 cup dark cocoa
1 tsp espresso powder
3 tbsp unsalted butter
1/2 cup (give to take) cream

Grease and flour a 9 inch round springform pan
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
Melt the butter, chocolate, espresso powder and milk together in a double boiler and then set aside.  Cool for about 15 minutes.
Sift the flour, dark cocoa and sugar together.
Add the chocolate mixture to the flour mixture.
Add the beaten eggs, vanilla and sour cream and mix well.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth out.
Bake for about 65 - 70 minutes or until a cake tester comes out with just wet crumbs on it.
Cool completely in the pan.

Icing:

Sift together the icing sugar and cocoa powder.
Add in the espresso powder.
Add the butter and enough cream to mix it together.  Continue adding cream until the icing gets to the thickness and consistency that you like.
Continue mixing out all the lumps.
Smooth over completely cooled cake.