Chocolate Decadence!

It was a weekend with family and a birthday to be celebrated.   The birthday person has a very special place in my heart, she is the mother of my beautiful grandchildren.  When I asked her what kind of cake she would like me to bake for her she immediately answered a “Chocolate Cake” of course.   It seems chocolate is her primary food in life…maybe chocolate is the cause of her beauty.

I immediately thought of a Sacher Torte, but when we chatted about what kind of a chocolate cake that she wanted she told me that it had to be all chocolate, no jams, no nuts, no combinations of creams simply a chocolate cake with a chocolate icing.

Well, I am known not to make simple cakes, there has be to something about a cake that makes it special and better than what I had done in the past.  The Sacher Torte as a base was still what I thought would please her, and the chocolate ganache  was certainly special and I knew she would like it, however, there had to be something else that would make this birthday cake even more special.

I started looking through my chocolate pastry cookbooks, and while I was turning the pages my thoughts and imagination clouded while reading between the lines of the recipes.  I was just about to give up when I came upon a chocolate mousse.  Yes, why not a chocolate mousse filling and piling the same mousse all over the cake. It certainly would make it a very special cake and worthy of celebrating a special person and her birthday.

Chocolate Mousse Birthday Cake

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Sacher Torte – ala Maja’s Viennese Kitchen

            3/4 cup butter – softened

                1 1/2 cup sugar

                3 eggs (large)

                1 1/2 cups flour

                1/4 cup cocoa

                1/2  tsp baking soda

                1 /2 cup sour cream

                1/2 cup boiling water

                1 tsp Vanilla

                1 tsp Almond Extract – optional

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                Cream butter and sugar until very fluffy

                Add egg yolks – one at a time – beat between each until well incorporated

                Add Vanilla Extract

                Combine flour, baking soda and cocoa, sift then add to the eggs

                and butter mixture

                Alternating, between flour and sour cream

                Now add the very hot water – slowly – keep mixing until well mixed

                Bake in 2 –  10 inch cake pans lined with parchment paper

                Grease and dust the sides of the pans with flour.

                Bake at 325 F for about 25 to 30 minutes (depending on your oven)

               Or, until cake tester comes out clean

Note:….If  my time is limited I reach for a “Duncan Hines” Devil’s Food cake mix…..it is a great alternative….and I have never been disappointed.

Simple Chocolate Mousse

Use Fabulous dark chocolate…I use 2 bars…..

Lindt “Excellence” Supreme Dark Chocolate ( 90 % Cacao 3.5 oz, 100g)

Ghirardelli  Intense Dark, Midnight Reverie  (86% Cacao 3.17 oz, 90g)

3 cups heavy cream – whipped

½ cup powdered sugar

2 tsp Vanilla

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Melt the chocolate in a double boiler, stirring until smooth.

While the chocolate is melting, place the cream into a chilled bowl,  helping the cream to whip faster.  Whip the cream until it forms soft peaks.

Add the powdered sugar and mix just enough to blend thoroughly.

Add half of the whipped cream to the melted chocolate, and mix well until combined.

Then gently fold in the remaining whipped cream until mixture is smooth and well blended.

Chill the mousse for about 30 minutes to an hour…then fill and ice the cake.

Note!  I piled the mousse about 2 inches high on to the first  cake layer

then refrigerated it for about 30 minutes.  This helped to hold the mousse in place when I placed the  second cake layer on top of it.

Once the filling was between the two cake layers I iced the cake and piled the rest of the mousse onto the top, and decorated it.  I used a pastry bag and a star tip to fill the top.

To give the cake a special touch…I went to my garden and wondered what I could use to make the cake special.  I have a huge bush of Russian Sage and it is in full bloom.  There is also  Marjoram with it’s delicate pink blossoms.  The pink blossoms would go well with the dark chocolate, but I felt that the aroma of Marjoram would not compliment the chocolate…I went back to the Sage and looked at it for a while, picking off the leaves, smashing them in my hand and smelling the potent sage fragrance.  Yes, Sage would go well with chocolate the two aromas are strong  yet  they would not clash.  They would compliment each other. When I finished decorating around the cake I inhaled the two aromas with delight.

 Here is today’s creation!

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Unauthorized use, distribution, and/or duplication of proprietary material without prior approval is prohibited. If you have any questions or would like permission, I can be contacted via email at: maria@majaskitchen.com   Feel free to quote me, just give credit where credit is due, link to the recipe, and please send people to my website, http://www.majaskitchen.com

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Maria Reisz Springer

Maja’s Kitchen LLC

Maja’s Kitchen LLC

maria@majaskitchen.com

http://www.majaskitchen.com

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The beautiful Plum and it’s irresistible juicyness!

The beautiful plum and its irresistible  juicyness makes it the perfect fruit to create a wonderful jam or dropping it into a dough for a perfect ending…

When the plums ripened in the late summer at my grandparent’s orchard in Croatia…life around the house became very busy. Every morning the maids had to go and pick up all the plums that had fallen off the trees and gathered them in large buckets.  Then my grandfather hired men from the village to set up the still just outside the barn and the process of making Slivovic was started.  Sliva is the word for plum in Croatian and Slivovic is the brandy that comes from plums.

I cannot describe the process of making Slivovic, all I remember I was watching the men sitting around this contraption (still) talking and tasting the drops that came out of a small tube/hose.  One afternoon I found all four of the  men snoozing in their chairs.  I gathered up my courage to taste the next drop that was hovering at the end of the tube to drop into the container below.  I put my finger under the drop and when it fell onto my finger I stuck it into my mouth and to my horror it had a terrible flavor.   At this point one of the men woke up and I had just enough time to escape his reaching hand that was going to let me know that I was not to be where I was.

I was about 6 or 7 years old….

You see, my grandfather had an Inn  that was a part of the big house called Bela Villa.

And while the Sliovic was brewing, my grandmother was busy making a Plum Cake – Pita od Slive, but not just one, she usually made several cakes to be sold as dessert at the Inn.

Here is my version of a Plum Cake which is translated from my mother’s recipe.

Plum Cake

3/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs

zest of  1 to 2 lemons – depending on the size of the lemons

1 tsp Vanilla

2 1/2 cups flour

2 tsp Baking Powder

1/2 cup milk

and

2 lbs of any kind of Plums

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Set the oven at 350 F

Prepare a 10 inch tart pan with a removable bottom, by greasing and dusting it with flour.

Remove the stone from the plums by cutting them in half and slice each half into 2 quarters.

With an electric mixer or hand mixer beat the butter and sugar until very light in color, and very fluffy.  Add the eggs  one at a time.  Add the zest of the lemons and Vanilla.   Mix the flour with the baking powder.  Add the flour mixture to the butter, sugar and eggs alternating with the milk.   Mix well until it becomes a smooth, soft dough. Transfer the dough to the tart pan and smooth it with a spatula.

Add the cut plum sections, skin down, on to the dough.

 

Bake the cake at 350 F for about 1 hour or until a toothpick comes out clean.

 

Cool the cake on a rack completely then transfer it onto a serving platter.

Serve with softly whipped heavy cream sweetened with powdered sugar before serving.

 

Or… just dust it with powdered sugar and serve it with Coffee or Tea!

Everyone loves this cake in my family especially with a big serving of ice cream!

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Do you have a Plum Cake or Tart recipe?

 

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Unauthorized use, distribution, and/or duplication of proprietary material without prior approval is prohibited. If you have any questions or would like permission, I can be contacted via email at: maria@majaskitchen.com   Feel free to quote me, just give credit where credit is due, link to the recipe, and please send people to my website, http://www.majaskitchen.com

Find me on Face Book! LinkedIn and Pinterest!

http://www.culinaryhalloffame.com

http://www.iacp.com

http://www.majaskitchen.com

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