Did that name tempt you? What about the picture? This recipe and the picture in my book had been tempting me for few years now. The picture was so attractive that it left me drooling every time I skimmed through them and finally I decided to give it a shot last week. What an eye catchy picture do to a recipe is just amazing. This cake is adapted from a cookbook that I got along with my food processor which I bought some 3 years ago. I guess I wouldn’t have tried it if there wasn’t a picture along with it. The book quotes “It would be an ultimate in desserts and is some what a cross between a cake and a mousse” and it exactly is. The cake is made with the best quality chocolate to get the optimum result and has a moist and squidgy centre with a light crust on top as you get in brownies. The use of minimal flour and almonds gives the ultimate softness to this cake and this is the softest cake I have ever eaten. I liked it better the second day. Don’t you believe it yet? Have a look at the second picture then! I served this cake along with strawberries and custard since I dint have any cream in stock at the time. You can also serve by simply dusting it with icing sugar or cocoa.
I have to confess, the crust was all eaten by myself and my son after we had a long tiring day at the park. My son also dug out a big chunk of it from the centre of the cake when I was away. So to cover the hideousness, I had to top it up with some fresh strawberries. The cake was baked the previous evening and I was too busy to shoot a picture. The next day was even busier that I lost my patience by evening and started kind of nicking the cake from here and there after eating the whole of crust.
On a different note, before going to the recipe, I would like to inform you all that I have uploaded my Index Tab menu on the top left of the blog for easier browsing. Please feel free to use them. Any suggestions are welcome. Other Tabs are not yet completed. I would be doing them slowly as time permits. Now to the recipe:
Ingredients:
4 medium size eggs
220g (1 cup, 8 oz) Castor sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
25g (3 ½ TBSP appx, 1 oz) plain flour
50g (2 oz, 1/3 cup packed) ground almonds
50 ml water (2 ½ fl oz, ¼ cup)
150g (5 ½ oz) dark chocolate, preferably 70% cocoa
125g (4 ½ oz) unsalted Butter
Whipped cream or custard to serve
Stawberries to garnish
Icing sugar or cooca powder to dust
Preparation:
1.Pre heat oven to 170 degrees Celsius 10 minutes prior to baking. Grease and line a 7” loose bottomed cake tin.
2. Using an electric whisk, whisk together eggs, sugar and vanilla on high speed for 3 minutes until very light and fluffy.
3. Meanwhile, put chocolate, butter and water in a large bowl and heat over a bowl of simmering water, but do not stir. When they are all melted, stir gently together.
4. Using a metal spoon, gently but thoroughly fold the creamed mixture into the chocolate mixture. Stir in the almonds and the flour. Pour into the tin and bake for about 50 mins – 1 hour. For checking the doneness, insert a skewer into the centre of the cake and the skewer should come out with few moist crumbs, but not a gooey sticky mixture. If you get gooey batter clinging on to the skewer put the cake back in and check after another 10 minutes. When completely done, remove from the tin and cool on wire rack. Dust with icing sugar or cocoa and serve along with strawberries and whipped cream or custard.
Notes:
1.The timing for the cake was given as 20 minutes but it took me an hour to bake this to perfection. So please check accordingly based on your oven. Check for doneness as given in point 4.
2. The cake will sink as it comes out of oven, it quotes in the book. It is meant to be slightly gooey in the middle and crunchy crust on the outside, quite like a good chocolate brownie.
3. This cake is freezable.
4. The recipe was given in metric measurements, I just measured in cups for the ease of use. Use just one kind of measurement at a time and do not mix both.
5. The cake tasted best the next day. It was difficult to get a sneat slice when it was warm.