Well this week saw my return to work after a break and I decided to bake some treats for my colleagues. I was only going to make a vanilla layer cake, but my boss put forward a pretty persuasive argument for some chocolate cake so my colleagues got both.
Chocolate Almond Cake
180g 70% chocolate
180g unsalted butter
Extra butter for greasing tin
200g ground almonds
8 eggs
1 tspn vanilla extract
215g caster sugar
60g cocoa powder
pinch of salt
Extra cocoa powder for decorating
Preheat oven to 150 degrees C. Line a 23 cm tin with greaseproof paper and grease with extra butter.
Break up chocolate and cut up butter. Place in a bowl over simmering water and melt them together. Cool.
Meanwhile beat together 2 whole eggs with 6 egg yolks and 200 g of the sugar until it thickens and is light. Fold in the cocoa powder and the ground almonds. Mix together with the melted chocolate/butter mixture and stir in vanilla extract (Don't use essence - it tastes yucky).
Beat 4 of the egg whites with pinch of salt to form stiff peaks. Fold in the remaining 15g sugar. Add a couple of spoonfuls of beaten egg white to chocolate mix and stir it in. Then fold in the rest of the egg whites gently keeping as much air in the mixture as possible.
Pour the mix into your prepared tin and bake in the preheated oven for 25 minutes.
Cool cake in tin, then turn out.
Dust with extra cocoa powder and maybe, if you want it a little sweeter, some icing sugar - you can make nice patterns on the top by putting strips of paper across the cake when you dust it.
Serve it plain, with cream or with some yummy vanilla icecream.
So there it is. A nice easy cake. Great for people with gluten intolerances, but not for those with nut allergies.
Sorry, I didn't think to take a photo until it had all disappeared!!
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