How To Make Dime Bar Cake

Another ripped off Ikea favourite, the Dime Bar cake recipe – or Daim Bar as it's apparently called in Sweden – is such a closely guarded secret that all you have to do is look at the ingredients on the back of the box to be able to work out more or less how it's made, although I think the home-made version is better. My very good friend Carole, an ace almond biscuit maker, came up with the idea of using soft cream cheese or Quark instead of buttercream, which is not only lower in fat, it makes the finished cake less sweet and sickly, but if you prefer to use buttercream, blend about 1 oz (25 g) of butter and 3 oz (75 g) of icing sugar with 1 tsp of vanilla essence and 1tbsp of water. Result.

1. Step 1:

   Base line two average-sized loose-bottomed cake tins with greaseproof paper.

2. Step 2:

   Whisk the egg whites with an electric hand whisk until the meringue is stiff enough to stand up in peaks and stays put when you turn the bowl upside down. (Takes about 2 minutes.)

3. Step 3:

   Stir in the sugar, ground almonds and 2 tsp of vanilla essence and ½ tsp salt then press half the mixture into each prepared cake tin and bake in a very low oven, approximately Gas Mark 1 (140°C) for 30–40 minutes until firm to the touch.

4. Step 4:

   Soften the Quark or soft cream cheese in a bowl with another 2 tsp of vanilla essence and use half to sandwich the two cakes together. Spread the other half over the top of the cake.

5. Step 5:

   Use a rolling pin or similar to crush the Dime bars between a large folded sheet of greaseproof paper and put the broken bars in a Pyrex bowl over a saucepan of hot water until the chocolate has melted completely.

6. Step 6:

   Spread the melted Dime bar mixture over the top of the cake and refrigerate.