Chocolate Almond Souffle Cake

I realised I haven't been on time with The Home Bakers for so long already. Nope, I've not forgotten about THB at all.

 

This time round, it's my turn to host with THB. I chose chocolate-almond souffle cake. When we were supposed to make our choices, I literally thumbed through the various recipes till I came across this recipe. Souffle is something that I've been wanting to bake for a while now. Yes, it's definitely on my to-bake list.

After reading through the recipe several times, I'm convinced that this cake is going to be soft and pillowy. It's just my kind of cake. The only downside about baking such a cake would be that you will keep eating without realising you have eaten alot. Ok, let's focus on the good points :)

This recipe is from Lou Seibert Pappas and it yields a 9 inch cake, serves 10 to 12 pax. See my comments/modifications in the notes below.

Ingredients:
 

193g silvered almonds

113g bittersweet chocolate

6 large eggs, separated

1/8 tsp salt

1/8 tsp cream of tartar

2 tbsp and 200g brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp almond extract

62.5g all purpose flour or 31.25g all purpose flour and 31.25g almond meal

 

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter and flour a 9 inch springform pan.
2. Scatter the nuts on a baking sheet and bake for 8 to 10 minutes or until lightly toasted. Let cool.
3. Using a food processor or blender, process the chocolate until finely grated. Turn out into a bowl.
4. Process the nuts until finely ground and add to the chocolate.
5. In a large bowl, beat the egg whites until foamy, add salt and cream of tartar, and beat until soft peaks form.
6. Add the 2 tbsp brown sugar and beat until stiff, glossy peaks form.
7. In a medium bowl, beat the egg yolks until thick and pale in colour.
8. Beat in the remaining 200g brown sugar and the vanilla, almond extracts until thick and pale in colour.
9. Stir the flour into the nut and chocolate mixture and fold half of the mixture into the yolk mixture.
10. Fold in 1/3 of the egg white mixture in to lighten it.
11. Fold in the remaining nut and chocolate mixture, then gently fold in the remaining egg whites. Spread evenly in the prepared pan.
12. Bake for about 30 to 35 minutes, until the top of the cake springs back when touched lightly.
13. Let cool completely in the pan on a wire rack.
14. Remove the sides of the pan and cut the cake into slices to serve.
 

Notes:

• the temperature I used is 160 degrees celsius.
• I used an 8 inch square tin.
• To enable the egg whites to be lighter and airier, I used about half the brown sugar into the egg white foam.

 Check out my cake below.

 

 

When I was making the cake, I realised oops, I forgot to roast the nuts to enable the nutty aroma to permeate the cake. The cake turned out to be quite soft despite the melted chunks of chocolate as I blended it. However, oddly enough the cake turned out to be a tad wet at the bottom, probably due to insufficient baking time in one sitting.

 

However, the only thing I would change about this cake would be using big chocolate chips instead of grating the chocolate to integrate with the ground almonds. Nevertheless, did I even mention that I ate a slice of the cake with 1 BIG scoop of vanilla bean ice cream?? It was superb!! Yes, literally in this sweltering weather, ice cream goes with anything ;)

 

Now that you have seen my cake, go on to check out my other fellow THBers' creations here.

 

 

I'm also submitting this post to Cook-Your-Books #11 organized by Joyce of baking flavours.