Can I Bake The Chocolate Fruit Cake In A Rectangular Pan?

Our answer

Nigella's Chocolate Fruit Cake (from FEAST) is a moist and dark fruit cake that has the addition of cocoa, though this adds to the richness of the cake rather than giving a definite chocolate flavour. It is often popular with those who don't like more "traditional" fruit cakes. The cake is baked in a 20cm (8-inch) springform pan, which gives a fairly deep cake.

Thie recipe is also sufficient for an 18cm (7-inch) square pan. If you were to use a 23x33cm (9x13-inch) rectangular pan then the cake will not have the same height as the round version, but this may be more suitable for cutting into bars anyway. The baking time is difficult to estimate, but will likely be shorter than for the round cake. It would also be a good idea to rotate the pan a quarter turn during baking, as the sharper corners of the rectangular pan mean that the edges of the cake can burn more easily. We would suggest baking the cake for 1 hour, rotating the pan and baking for another 30 minutes, then checking to see if the cake is done. Bake for longer, if necessary. We would also suggest lining the cake pan with a triple layer of baking parchment (parchment paper), making sure that the parchment comes about 2cm (3/4 inch) above the sides of the pan (on all sides). This will help to protect the cake slightly as it bakes (as it is difficult to wrap the outside of the pan) and also make it easier to remove the cake from the pan once it is cool. However, we would emphasize that as we have not tried the cake in this form, we are unable to guarantee the results.