Monday 15 February 2016

Chocolatines

These jumped out at me from Mary Berry's Baking Bible as something I'd like to give a go, and I had planned a long ride to Portsmouth and back for the Sunday, so I made these as a "recovery snack" for my return.

The recipe looks pretty complex, however it can be broken down into 2 parts...a basic genoise sponge, and a very complex chocolate butter-cream. All the challenges I faced were with the icing...when I was mixing the syrup and the egg yolks, I had some syrup coll into a lump immediately, and when I mixed in the chocolate, some of it cooled against the bowl, forming flecks of solid chocolate...so all temperature-related issues. When I do these again, I'll almost certainly use a simpler icing recipe (a bit of investigation shows that similar results can be yielded using icing sugar and water in place of the egg yolks).

The end result is very pretty, and delicious.

Chocolatines - Recipe

  • Pre-heat oven to 160'C 
  • Grease and line a 20cm square baking tin

Sponge Ingredients

  • 3 large eggs
  • 75g caster sugar
  • 65g self-raising flour
  • 30g cornflour
  • 40g melted, cooled butter

1) Put the eggs and sugar into a large bowl, and whisk until pale and thickened (the indicator it's done is that you can lift the whisks out, and leave a trail across the top of the mixture). It will take a good 7-8 minutes at least to get to this point

 2) Sift the flours into the mixture, and gently fold in (I find it easier to do the flour in 2 halves, mixing in one, then the other half).

3) Pour the cooled butter around the outer edge of the mixture, and fold in again.

4) Pour the mixture into the prepared baking tin, and bake in the oven for 35 minutes

5) Once cooked, remove from the oven, and turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely

Creme au beurre chocolat recipe (Chocolate Buttercream)

Note - I think there are easier ways to make this. Also, I ran out, though I may have been too generous with the filling

Icing Ingredients

  • 50g caster sugar
  • 60ml water
  • 2 egg yolks
  • 175g softened butter
  • 100g 40% cocoa solids chocolate (melted and cooled)

1) Put the sugar and water into a small pan, and gently heat until the sugar has fully dissolved

2) Bring to the boil for 2-3 minutes

3) Place the egg yolks in a mixing bowl, and start whisking them while pouring on the sugar syrup in a thin stream

4) Whisk the mixture until fully cooled

5) In another bowl, beat the butter until fully creamed

6) Beat the egg yolk mixture into the butter

7) Beat the melted chocolate into the mixture

Assembly

  • ~100g mixed, chopped nuts (I used hazelnut, almond and brazil nut)

1) Cut the cooled sponge in half horizontally, to get 2 equal tiers (use a bread knife)

2) Use a small amount of the icing to sandwich the 2 parts together again

3) Using the bread knife, but the sponge into 9 equal squares...if required, trim the edges to make them square

4) Using a table knife, or a small palette knife cover the sides in buttercream

5) Roll the exposed sides in the chopped nuts, to form a nut coating around the sides

6) Place the remaining buttercream in a piping bag with a small star nozzle

7) Decorate the tops of the cakes with small peaks