This recipe is very similar to the Sweet Chestnut Torte, but is much richer and if you accidentally leave out two egg whites like I did, much denser as well. It kind of tastes like a flourless chocolate cake, but is better for you. You would never know it was made with chestnut purée. My mom saw the recipe and liked it better than the sweet chestnut torte, so I decided to make both. Typical indecision.
Ingredients:
4 oz bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped (I had about 1 oz of my favourite dark truffle ricemilk chocolate from Terra Nostra and 3 oz of bittersweet baking chocolate. The bittersweet keeps this from becoming ridiculous sugary with the butterscotch frosting, but I think next time I would go half and half)
cocoa
sugar
boiling water
sweetened chestnut purée (again, you can buy unsweetened and sweeten it yourself)
egg yolks
rum (amber or dark. Or brandy or cognac are fine. Or an extract)
vanilla
4 egg whites!! Not two...I got really excited after separating two eggs successfully and forgot to keep going
cream of tartar
1/4 cup flour. Yes, that's all.
Follow the same pan instructions as for the sweet chestnut torte, using parchment paper to line the bottom. This cake also freezes very well and becomes even more ridiculously dense and rich. Do not thaw. Eat frozen.
I spent way too much time fussing over how finely the chocolate was chopped, and everything was just fine when I poured the boiling water over the chocolate, cocoa, and half the sugar. It melted easily enough when I whisked, and I ended up with no clumps of chocolate. I had the same problem adding the chestnut purée as the last cake, though, in that it didn't want to be whisked (off it's feet?). It's supposed to be added along with the egg yolks, rum and vanilla. Cleaning out a sticky whisk multiple times is no fun. If you bang it on the edge of the bowl to get things un-stuck, chocolate flies everywhere. I think a food processor would be a good idea here too, or start mixing with a spoon and then switch to using your hands. If you use your hands right away you'll just end up with a lot of chocolate on them, and make a mess, and waste chocolate. None of these things are good. One is unforgivable.
Then you're supposed to add the flour. I don't know why you can't add it with the chestnut purée, but Medrich is a far better baker than I, so I'll limit my questioning. I combined the other ingredients, and then I added the flour and respected my teacher.
In a medium bowl I beat 2 egg whites with the cream of tartar to soft peaks. Funny, it didn't seem to expand very much...but I added the remaining sugar, up-ed the speed to high and beat to stiff peaks. I folded a scoop of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture and then folded in the remaining whites. Into the pan it all went, where I smoothed it down on top. Then into the preheated oven at 350 for 30 minutes, until there were "a few moist crumbs" clinging to my toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake. Now I was expecting the cake to collapse in the middle. The recipe even says it will. Funny, Medrich didn't warn me in the sweet chestnut torte recipe that that would happen. I thought it had been all my fault. Maybe I'm not as incompetant with egg whites as I thought?
No, I probably am. A moment of revelation. There were supposed to be 4 egg whites...the only reason my cake didn't collapse was because there wasn't enough air in it in the first place. I am still a disappointment to myself and meringue everywhere. At least I made amazing butterscotch frosting...wait, that didn't go perfectly either. I'll blame the joy of cooking for that one, though. Medrich, I will not blame. This one was all me. The dense cake was still delicious, at least. I won't give the butterscotch forsting recipe again here, since it's in the last post, and the only difference with the topping was the addition of a bakeapple syrup instead of a blueberry syrup. Same concept.
Bakeapple Syrup
Well, it kind of came in a bottle...so I just heated it up and drizzled it over the frosted cake. It was a local specialty product, and the tart flavour was a nice break from the rich chocolate. I was happy with it. Even if I made a million mistakes, the Master's Potluck guests were none the wiser. Oh, and it was delicious. So many desserts and so much addictive sugar.
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