PARADISE FOUND, DARK CHOCOLATE AND AMARENA RECIPE
Prep Time: 1H00 Cooking Time: 0H07M Serves: 8
Decadent layers of Cloud Forest cake, soaked in Somerset cider brandy, topped with light Rio Caribe chocolate ganache studded with wild Italian Amarena cherries.
Ingredients
For the Base
6 eggs
175g raw cane sugar
150g unsalted butter
180g 100% Rio Caribe cacao (If you want to use 70% cocoa chocolate, use 260g of it and reduce the sugar to 100g)
100g ground almonds
24 Fabri Amarena cherries in syrup
2 tablespoons of Somerset Cider Brandy (I use Somerset Cider Brandy Company Apple Brandy but you can use any brandy)
For the ganache top
400ml double cream
80g raw cane sugar
90g roughly chopped Rio Caribe 100% cacao (If you want to use 70% cocoa chocolate, use 130g of it and reduce the sugar to 40g)
Equipment
You will need 8 x 8cm round stainless steel moulds or cake cutters
Baking paper
Share & Print
Willie Recommends
Method
To make The Cloud Forest Cake base
- Beat 6 whole eggs with 175g sugar until doubled in size.
- Melt the butter with the chocolate in a bowl over hot water.
- Gently fold half the egg mixture into the chocolate, then fold in the other half
- Mix in100g of ground almonds, and spread on baking tray so that once risen and fallen back the height is just less than 1cm
- Bake in a tray for 7 minutes at 180 degrees.
- Take 2 tablespoons of the syrup that the Amarena cherries came in, and add 2 tablespoons of brandy.
- While the cake is still hot, make holes in the base with a fork, and pour over the cherry brandy syrup.
- Cut 8cm diameter circles out of the sheet of cake and leave the cutters / moulds on the cake
For the ganache top
- Gently heat the cream in a thick bottomed sauce pan
- When hot but not bubbling, put in the chocolate and the sugar and stir until fully dissolved.
- Cut strips of baking paper to line the inside of the top of each mould.
- Pour the ganache over the bases, until it is 2cm deep
- Push in 3 cherries into the ganache, so they are just poking out of the top
- Refrigerate for about 30 minutes until set and cool.
- Take out of the fridge, and push the desserts up out of their moulds and peel off the baking paper
- Serve with cream
