The Affinities Cake

Rococo: Mastering the Art of Chocolate

Posted by Orion Books

About

I came across a simpler version of this vegan-friendly cake in Grenada, when it was made for Mott Green, co-founder of the Grenada Chocolate Company, by Kate Bauman at Almost Paradise Cottages. My version of the ‘volcanic’ cake was created for the 10th anniversary of Deutsche Bank and Solomon R. Guggenheim’s collaboration. It is a triumph of alchemy and is very simple to make. The iced cake improves with being
kept for a day.

serves 8–10

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You Will Need (14 things)

  • 150 ml Whipping Cream
  • 400 ml Prune Juice
  • 6 tbsp Olive Oil , plus extra for greasing
  • 1 tbsp good quality Balsamic Vinegar
  • 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
  • 1 tsp Bicarbonate Of Soda
  • 175 g good quality Dark Chocolate
  • 100 g Ground Almonds
  • 200 g golden Caster Sugar
  • 200 g Plain Flour
  • 75 g unsweetened Cocoa Powder
  • A small pinch of Salt
  • Fresh pink Rose Petals , to decorat
  • Deep 20cm round Cake Tin , or loose-bottomed 20cm cake tin

Steps (3 steps, 40 minutes)

  1. 1

    Preheat the oven to 150°c/gas mark 2. grease the insides of the cake tin with olive oil and line the bottom of the tin with greaseproof paper. if you are using a loose-bottomed tin, double-line it with greaseproof paper (line the base, line the sides, then line the base again to seal the lining), to prevent the mixture leaking out.

  2. 2

    Sift the flour, cocoa powder and bicarbonate of soda into a large bowl, then add the sugar, ground almonds and salt. Make three holes in the dry mixture with a spoon. Put the vanilla in one hole, the vinegar in the second, and the oil into the third. Pour in the prune juice and mix well. Bubbles will start to rise to the surface. Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin and bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. Remove the cake from the tin and leave it to cool on a wire rack.

  3. 3

    To make the ganache icing, blitz the chocolate into crumbs in a food processor. Place the crumbs in a heatproof glass bowl. heat the cream to boiling point in a heavy-based saucepan, then pour the cream over the chocolate. gently mix the chocolate with the cream, working from the centre of the bowl outwards with a rubber spatula, until you have a smooth and glossy emulsion. let it cool to room temperature, then spread it on top of the cooled cake.