February 14, 2012

A CAKE FOR VALENTINE’S DAY

success5A This recipe is my very favourite chocolate cake or dessert recipe.  It’s gluten-free, too.  It makes a very moist and dense cake with just the right amount of chocolatey flavour – not too overpowering.

bookIt’s called warm chocolate torte and I first found the recipe in a lovely little book written by Linda Collister called “Heavenly Chocolate”.

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It’s fairly rich and you only need a small slice each.  To begin with anyway !!  You have to pace yourself a little for this cake !!  An ideal cake for Valentine’s day and perfect for my entry into this month’s Tea Time Treats Challenge.

The cake is meant to be served warm and the recipe suggests wrapping it in foil and reheating gently if it has been allowed to go cold.  Personally I find it just as scrumptious cold as it is warm.

Recently I served it with pears poached in red wine.  You can read about those here.

Tea Time Treats Blogging Challenge

This is the first time I have entered this particular challenge, which is hosted by Kate of What Kate Baked or Karen of Lavendar and Lovage each month.  This month’s theme is, not surprisingly, Romance.  Which goes perfectly with chocolate I think.  This month, Kate is the host.

I hope you try it, it’s a beauty !!

Here’s my version of warm chocolate torte.

Ingredients

125g plain chocolate

115g unsalted butter

85g caster sugar

4 eggs

115g ground almonds

½tsp vanilla extract

pinch of salt

icing sugar for dusting

Method

First separate the eggs. 

Next, melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl, gently, over a saucepan of barely simmering water.  Put on one side to cool.

Grease a 20cm springform cake tin and line the base with baking parchment.  Preheat the oven to 200°C.

Beat the butter with an electric beater until creamy.  Add the sugar and beat again until light and fluffy.  Add the egg yolks, one at a time and beat again.

Add the cooled chocolate and vanilla extract and beat them in.  Stir in the ground almonds with a metal spoon.

In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites with the salt until the soft peak stage.  Using the metal spoon, gently fold them into the mixture, a third at a time, gently so as not to lose any of the whisked-in air.

Spoon the mixture into the prepared tin and level the top gently.

Bake at 200°C for 10 minutes.  Then reduce the oven temperature to 180°C and bake for a further 7-10 minutes until the cake is just set.

Remove from the oven and place the cake on a wet tea-towel for 10-15 minutes.  Leave it in the tin for this time but run a knife around the edge to loosen it.

Then gently turn out the cake, dust with icing sugar and serve warm.

It’s also nice served with some red berries and a little single cream. 

Serves 8-10.

5 comments:

  1. Jean, this is the perfect recipe for today! If we'd any gluten free plain chocolate in the house I'd be baking it right now.

    As it is, it will have to wait until we go shopping in a couple of days...

    But there again, I could always get my bike out....

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  2. Jean this really sounds superb. I don't bake often but this is on my very soon 'to do'list, thanks for this. Diane

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  3. Love it! Brilliant entry too. Looks diligent and fluffy and very romantic!

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  4. Thank you so much for your very romantic and very tasty entry to Tea Time Treats! I love the great big heart on the top!

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  5. Beautiful! It looks delicious too!

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