Archives for November 2010
Valrhona Flourless, Fernet Menta Caramel.
8 November 2010 | cake, chocolate, delicious, dessert, faithful readers, plated dessert | 5 Responses
So here we are again, another blog post and another version of the ever evolving flourless chocolate cake. Why do I continually return to this cake, faithful readers might ask? And why do I do so many mother loving chocolate desserts already? Well, my answer is this: I fucking love chocolate, and a flourless cake is a clean way to showcase it’s decadence. Served at room temperature this cake is smooth, rich as fuck, and chocolatey as a motherfucker. In the past I’ve typically made this cake with Cocoa Barry 64% and it was good. This past year I made the switch over to all things Valrhona and have never looked back. The recipe below uses a combination of Jivara 40% and Couer de Guanaja 80% chocolates. The result is a sweet and creamy smoothness with a nice strong bitter backbone. I bake the shit in thin layers and hit the bottom with a crunchy layer of milk chocolate and feuilletine, then glaze the top with a ganache of sorts and then the milk chocolate decorative lines. The cake itself is pretty standard, nothing I haven’t kind of done before. The blood orange ice cream, yeah…you’ve seen it before. The ice cream is perched on a simple chocolate tuile, which is stuck to the cake with an equally simple chocolate cremeaux. The real joy in this plate for me is in the sauce. Fernet Menta Caramel suckers!! Again, not a huge deviance from the formula here, kids. I been putting booze in caramel from the beginning. But this is Fernet, and I’ve been wanting to work it into a dessert forever. So here it is. Also garnishing the plate is a mint foam, and what I think is a nice, subtle use of the ubiquitous mint leaf.
Valrhona Chocolate Flourless Cake
!5 oz Valrhona Jivara 35%
7 oz Valrhona Couer de Guanaja 80%
12 oz butter
11.25 oz egg
9 0z sugar
4.5 oz water
1. Preheat your convection oven to 275 F and prepare the desired mold.
2. Melt chocolate and butter over a double boiler.
3. Whisk together the eggs, sugar and water.
4. When the chocolate and butter are melted, whisk in the eggs until thoroughly incorporated.
5. Pour into the prepared mold and bake in a covered water bath until just set, like a cheesecake.
To review the methodology for this recipe click here.
Fernet Menta Caramel
12 oz sugar
5 oz corn syrup
6 oz butter
1.25 cups heavy cream
1/2 cup Fernet Menta
1. Weigh the sugar and corn syrup into a heavy bottomed sauce pot. Caramelize according to your tastes.
2. Whisk in the butter, continue whisking until incorporated.
3. Whisk in the heavy cream until incorporated, return to a boil.
4. Pour the caramel through a strainer into a storage vessel.
5. When the caramel has cooled to room temperature, whisk in the fernet menta. Serve warm.
For the Blood Orange ice cream click here.
To see a video of me plating this bitch up, click here.
To see a video of a kitten riding a turtle, click here.
