Marie’s Obuchowski’s cherished Chocolate Cake

Marie Obuchowski was born in 1931 in Brussels. When war broke out, Marie’s family fled to France where they were sent to an “open camp” and then to the French concentration camp, Rivesalte.

She was one of many hundreds of Jewish children helped by Œuvre de Secours aux Enfants (OSE), a French-Jewish humanitarian organisation that saved and aided many hundreds of mainly Jewish refugee children.

Marie was taken with her brother from the camp to a hostel in Versailles until it was discovered by the Germans and was then one of four girls sent to a convent where only the Mother Superior knew of her background. Her brother was sent to a farm.

She remained hidden until the war ended and travelled to England to live with her uncle. Marie’s late husband Bob was also a survivor of the Holocaust, having been in the Lodz ghetto, Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Theresienstadt and Rhemsdorf.

Marie loves a game of Kalooki and plays two or three times a week. She is a member of Jewish Care’s Holocaust Survivors’ Centre in Hendon, which offers a programme of social, cultural and therapeutic events and supports 500 Holocaust survivors each year. It is the only centre of its kind in Europe.

Ingredients

• Block of Tomor margarine (less one slice)
• 2 cups caster sugar
• 5 eggs
• 5 tbsp water
• 5 tbsp cocoa
• 11/2 cups self-raising flour
• Few drops of vanilla essence

Method:

1. Put margarine, sugar, sieved cocoa and water in bowl and into the microwave.
2. Put on for 1½ mins, mix, then another 1½ mins. Mix again.
3. Separate five eggs.
4. Take five tablespoons of the chocolate mixture and put in the fridge. This will be for the topping.
5. Beat the whites and beat the yolks separately and add to the chocolate mixture. Let it cool.
6. Add the flour to the chocolate mixture. Bake 1 hour at gas mark 3/170°C.
7. Once chilled, pour the refrigerated chocolate mixture over the cake.

For more information about the Holocaust Survivors’ Centre call 020 8203 9033 or visit jewishcare.org