Reading recipes is entertaining, in and of itself. I’ve been doing it for years, ever since we were in the bush in Alaska and we had only the food supplies we had brought with us to last for the year. In that particular situation, reading recipes was strictly for entertainment as I had no means of fixing them.
One group of recipes always caught my imagination – torten. I never tried to make any of them once we returned to civilization… until now.
Chocolate Almond Torte could just as easily be called "death by chocolate."
A simple cake in terms of ingredients: Eggs, finely chopped almonds, finely chopped bread crumbs, pinch of salt, and grated chocolate. Six ounces of grated chocolate. The gluten free bread I’ve been making recently lent itself to the task of providing crumbs admirably. Into an ungreased spring form pan the mix went, and an hour later it was done.
Yes, it is a wee bit lopsided. This was a function of slicing it horizontally and then not getting the two halves lined up properly when I flipped them around and upside down.
The cake is so delicate and tender that handling it at all was difficult. I really wanted something that resembled a cake and not a pile of crumbs. Once I managed to get the pieces flipped over and lined up fairly closely on the edges, I had no choice but to call it good. Getting the cake level would have required more handling, and been a disaster. I resisted the urge to try to achieve perfection in appearance since obviously I wasn’t going to get there.
In between the two thin slices of cake I spread a thin layer of seedless raspberry jam for the filling. On top is a chocolate glaze icing which is made from six ounces (again!) of semi-sweet chocolate melted and then combined with a 230F sugar syrup. The chocolate hardens almost instantly upon the addition of the syrup and so making it completely smooth on the cake was beyond my reach on this first attempt.
Nobody who ate this complained about aesthetics. It tasted like a chocolate truffle candy and pretty much melted in our mouths. A successful experiment. It did make quite the mess out of my kitchen when I was making it. So, great fun was had by all!
+4F (-16C) Typical low temperature for this time of year. Clear skies and subtle pastel colors.
The sun wasn’t very high above the horizon when I took this picture this morning. An hour later the temperature outside hasn’t increased. It’s going to be cold today.
The house was a little cool when we woke up this morning, and the stove is cheerfully producing heat. It won't stay cool long and sitting next to the stove is just a great spot to play on my computer.
Dan put the cast iron pot for humidifying the house on top of the stove, and we must add water to it frequently at these stove temperatures. Yesterday Mishkin’s fur was crackling with static electricity, a sure sign that we need to put moisture into the air.
Speaking of "sparky" here he is surveying his realm and looking for somebody to wrestle with.
He’s been frisky and affectionate, both, this morning. He always misses us if we are gone from the house for a few hours, which we were yesterday. He’s not a typical cat as he doesn’t give us the ‘cold shoulder’ and sit with his back towards us to show us what he thought of us leaving without his permission. He is just more attentive and clingy the next day, and won’t let us out of his sight all day until he’s sure we aren’t planning another escape. Silly kitty.