Amarula Chocolate Torte

Ok, so I made my own birthday cake. Who else was going to do it? My husband's kitchen skills don't stretch to chocolate cakes. Or any cakes. Or anything much besides steak and washing dishes - both of which he does really well, though!! (Don't worry - he'll never read this).
So, buy a cake? Uh, no.
And you know what - it's my party, I can bake if I want to : )

{torte (tôrt, tôrt)          n. 

A rich cake made with many eggs and little flour. Usually containing chopped nuts.
[German. Perhaps from Italian torta, cake, tart, from Late Latin torta, a kind of bread.]}

Amarula Chocolate Torte.
Recipe by Tea, Cake and Create

Preheat oven to 180'C
Grease and line 3x 6in (15cm) pans or 2x 8in pans.

400g dark chocolate discs or dark chocolate cut into small pieces
120ml Amarula
6 eggs separated
80g butter
80g + 1 tbs caster sugar
150g ground almonds
50g cake flour
50g cocoa

Melt the chocolate and Amarula together in a double boiler.
Allow to cool slightly.

Sift the dry ingredients together - flour, cocoa and ground almonds.

Whip the egg whites until soft peaks form. Sprinkle in 1tbs caster sugar, then whip until stiff.

In a separate bowl, cream the butter and remaining caster sugar together. Add the egg yolks and beat until light and creamy.
With the mixer on low speed, slowly pour in the melted chocolate /Amarula; mix well.
Add the dry ingredients - mix until just incorporated.

Fold in one spoon of the egg whites, then gently fold in the rest.
Continue folding the batter until the whites are no longer visible.

Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cake pans.

Bake at 180'C for 35-40minutes, or until a skewer inserted comes out with moist crumbs attached.

Allow to cool in the pans before turning out onto a cooling rack.

ChocolateMousse Icing
Recipe by Tea, Cake and Create

(This recipe produces enough icing to spread between the cake layers and to cover the outside of the cake. Halve the ingredients if you'll be leaving it - the cake! - naked.)

150g butter
2x 250g tubs cream cheese
100g icing sugar, sifted
50g cocoa powder, sifted
2-4 tbs fresh cream or milk
1 tsp vanilla extract.

Beat the butter until soft and creamy, add the sifted icing sugar. Mix well.
Add in the cream cheese. Mix until just combined.
Then add the vanilla and sifted cocoa. Mix until incorporated.
If the icing is too stiff to spread on a cake - add the fresh cream / milk until it is softer.

Spread icing onto the cake once it is completely cool.

Try to keep some cake for the next day - it gets even better with age. As good things should ; )

xxM

Dark Chocolate Carrot Cake

This is just a quick entry - for Julie-Anne, a fellow baking mom : )
 Go visit her on Facebook at thecupcakemomza.


This dark chocolate carrot cake is just sublime!
It is a deliciously moist chocolate cake, with subtle undertones of orange. You are hardly aware of the presence of the carrots - if only in your conscience, where they re-assure you that what you're eating must be good for you... surely ; )

The original recipe is from the book From My Oven, by Fay Lewis (Struik): great recipes and lovely photographs!

Ingredients:
185g butter, at room temp
10ml grated orange rind
160g caster sugar
2 jumbo eggs
15ml golden syrup
375ml finely grated carrots (I use the food processor)
200g self-raising flour
2.5ml bicarb
75ml cocoa powder
200ml milk

Method:
Preheat oven to 175'C
Grease a 21x11cm Bundt tin. (I usually use a rose shaped silicone cake mould....but it can be tricky with such a moist cake...)

In a mixer, cream together the butter caster sugar and orange rind.
Beat in the eggs, one at a time, and then the syrup.

Add the carrots and milk; then sift in the flour, cocoa and bicarb. Mix gently until combined.

Spoon into the prepared tin.

Bake for 40 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.

Remove from the oven, and leave to cool before turning out from the tin.

The original recipe calls for  Cream Cheese icing, but really all this cake needs is a drizzle of something....cream ... melted chocolate... white chocolate.
...Or a great big dollop of Vanilla ice-cream.
In fact, it is actually a perfect "desert" cake - it would also be delicious hot from the oven, with any of the above toppings.

...drizzled with white chocolate...

Enjoy!


xxM