We love a royally-approved chocolate dessert!
As a perennial fan of the royal family, I’m always interested to know about their likes and dislikes. Entering the most festive time of the year, I wondered what Queen Elizabeth’s favorite cake was.
In my mind, it was something elegant and decadent. And I was mostly right—except that I never considered that Queen Elizabeth would pick a no-bake cake as her absolute favorite.
What is Queen Elizabeth’s favorite cake?
I love a good no-bake dessert. The family restaurant down the street from where I live makes a fantastic no-bake cheesecake, and it’s the only place where I have never turned down dessert after a meal. But Lilibet’s preference was for a no-bake chocolate cake made with tea biscuits—or what we call cookies.
Make no mistake, Queen Elizabeth absolutely loved chocolate. In fact, her birthday cake was always a big chocolate confection. It was made all the more special by the fact that Lent usually preceded her April 21 birthday, and chocolate was something she always gave up for Lent.
These are the kinds of intimate details that Darren McGrady shares in his book, Eating Royally. It’s a favorite collector’s item of mine, detailing the favorite recipes and eating habits of the royal family. Darren McGrady was a royal chef in Buckingham Palace for years before moving on to Kensington Palace to become the personal chef for Princess Diana.
The best way to eat this no-bake cake is very cold—as in straight from the refrigerator. “I can’t say how long it keeps because I have never had one last longer than five minutes before I was staring at a plate of crumbs,” he writes. “Without a doubt, it is the Queen’s favorite tea cake.”
The cake recipe is relatively simple. All it calls for is unsalted butter, granulated sugar, dark chocolate, white chocolate and an egg. Who knew that such a royal person had such a simple appetite? But that was Queen Elizabeth for you!
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