Bake Along # 4 - Chocolate Almond Torte

For our bake along this time Joyce, Zoe and myself have decided to bake something from the baking site, Joy of Baking, a flourless cake. A Chocolate Almond Torte. It's fun baking along with some friends, of the same recipe and the good thing is sometimes i get prealerts from them like in this case, Joyce told me, 'hey, watch out the temperature! My oven's very hot! Ok, i read the recipe again before starting all that and see what else should i be expecting as this is my first time baking a flourless cake. It says, " during baking, the torte will rise and the surface will become cracked and crisp. After baking, the torte shrinks, leaving a crater like top that remains crisp. Dont worry if the pieces of the crust fall off. This is a rustic looking cake and isnt supposed to be perfect. Simply press the fallen pieces back into place. "

So as expected, the cake rise and rise and rise and the unexpected thing was , it kept rising until the batter overflowed from the baking tin! At this point, the surface of the cake has already cracked and the whole thing looks like a mini volcano eruption going on in the oven! So after 50 minutes of baking time, the 'supposedly' completed baking time, i took the cake out and checked, no, the cake 's not done yet, still wet. At the same time, try to save some pieces of crust that are hanging on to the cake and pressed it gently back and returned to the oven. It then took another 40 minutes to cook the cake.  Results? This is moist, most chocolatey, with a nice almond nutty flavour and a little fudgy inside. Unbelievably delicious!! Drop by Joyce and Zoe's blogs too to see their chocolate almond tortes.

Recipe ( from Joy of Baking )
Ingredients:
1 cup ( 100gms) of finely ground almonds
( Ground 1 cup or blanced or sliced almonds in your food processor)
4 large eggs
7 ounces ( 200gms ) semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, chopped
150gms unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
150gms granulated /caster sugar, divided into 100gms and 50gms
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 375F/190C and line an 8inch/20cm springform pan with parchment paper. ( I set my oven at 160C)

2. Separate the cold eggs, placing the egg yolks in one bowl and the egg whites in another. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand until reach room temperature ( about 30 minutes) or get room temperature eggs and separate egg whites and egg yolks

3. Melt the chopped chocolate and butter in a stainless steel bowl placed over a saucepan of simmering water. Once melted, remove from heat.

4.Meanwhile, place the egg yolks and 100gms of sugar in the bowl of your electric mixer, fitted with paddle attachment. Cream the yolks and sugar until pale and thick ( about 2-3 minutes). Beat in the melted chocolate mixture and vanilla extract. Fold in the ground almonds.

5.In a clean bowl, place the egg whites and whisk until foamy. Add the cream of tartar and continue whisking until soft peaks form. Gradually sprinkle the remaining  50gms of sugar and whisk until stiff peaks form. Fold about 1/4 of the whites into the chocolate batter to lighten it. Quickly fold in the rest of the whites and mix only until incorporated.

6. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for about 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the ccenter of the cake has a few moist crumbs. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack. The cake will rise during baking but falls during cooling, leaving a crisp and cracked crust. Once cool, run a spatula around the inside of the pan before releasing the sides. If not serving immediately, cover and place in the refrigeraor. Serve cold or at room temperature. Dust with icing sugar. ( mine took 90 min for cake done)

I suspected i overmixed the egg whites into the chocolate batter that caused the batter to overflow. I read later from other sites that it's okay to leave some white strands in the mixture otherwise the batter will be too much, not too sure though...

If you're interested in flourless cake, you can also take a look at some other versions that Cheah and Jeannie made not long ago..
Flourless Choco Hazelnut Cake by Cheah ( No Frills Recipe) and
Flour Free Lavender and Orange Cake by Jeannie ( Baking Diary)

Our next bake along will be Whole Wheat Carrot cake taken from Cake Keeper Cakes by Lauren Chattman. If you have the book, you can join in the bake along if you like and post it up on July 18.