12 Feb 2015

The Outrageous Chocolate Cake: chocolate & meringue mousse, brownies

Superfood, raw food, GI rating, detox...I' m not going to talk to you about any of these today. 
This recipe is one of these which ambition is to break all the rules of reason, and pack as much indulgence and flavour as possible in one single cake. 
To all chocolate lovers in the world, I want to say : this one is a winner. 
It's naughty. Worse, it's outrageous.
But my dear, it's so good.


My ultimate Chocolate Cake: 
A chocolate & meringue mousse on top of a brownie base

Chocolate brownie base

Ingredients

250g good quality cocoa chocolate (I used Valrhona)
250g unsalted butter
300g golden caster sugar
3 large eggs, plus 1 extra egg yolk, lightly beaten
60g plain flour
½ tsp baking powder
Pinch of salt
60g good quality cocoa powder
 

Method: 

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180deg C, and line the bottom of a loose base cake tin with baking parchment and butter up the parchment and tin.

2. Set a bowl over, but not touching, a pan of simmering water, and add 200g of the chocolate, broken into pieces. Allow to melt, stirring occasionally, and then remove from the heat immediately.

3. Meanwhile, beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, and break the rest of the chocolate into chips.

4. With the mixer still running, gradually add the eggs, beating well between each addition to ensure it's thoroughly incorporated before pouring in any more. Leave mixing on a high speed for five minutes until the batter has a silky sheen, and has increased in volume.

5. Remove the bowl from the mixer, and gently fold in the melted chocolate and chocolate chips with a metal spoon, followed by the sifted flour, baking powder, salt, cocoa powder.

6. Spoon the mixture into the tin, and bake for 30 minutes. Test with a skewer; it should come out sticky, but not coated with raw mixture. If it does, put it back into the oven for another 3 minutes, then test again.

7. When the brownies are ready, remove the tin from the oven and place it in a cool place (I put mine out in the garden) to cool completely. Once cold, cover the sides left free of the tin with a large string of cling film all around (optional, but it will prevent the mousse from sticking to the sides of the tin)

Chocolate and meringue mousse

Ingredients

250g good quality cocoa chocolate 
6 eggs
1 or 2 supermarket bought meringue nests (optional), broken into coarse pieces + 1 for decoration
a pinch of salt

Method: 

1/ Set a medium bowl over, but not touching, a pan of simmering water, and add the chocolate, broken into pieces. Allow to melt, stirring occasionally, and then remove from the heat. Leave to cool while you do the next step.

2/ Separate the eggs and place the whites and a pinch of salt in a big bowl (or in the clean bowl of a baking mixer). With an electric whisk,  whisk the white until firm. 

3/ Add the egg yolks to the melted chocolate one at a time and mix well between each addition with a wooden spoon.

4/ Fold very gently and carefully the whisked egg whites a little at a time in the chocolate mixture, making sure you don't break the white not to loose the air within the whites and get a light mousse texture. Once all the whites have been folded, fold in the meringue pieces carefully. Pour and level the mousse over the cooled down brownie base, and transfer to the fridge to set for at least 3 hours. 

5/ Loosen the cake tin sides and bottom, carefully peel the cling film from the sides. Loosen the brownie from the cake tin base with a pallet knife and transfer to a cake stand.
Decorate the top of the cake with broken meringue nest pieces.

Chocolate brownie recipe from Felicity Cloake

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