TWD: Chocolate Caramel Almond Cake

The Tuesdays with Dorie posts have been a little willy nilly this month. This recipe for Chocolate Caramel Chestnut (Almond) Cake was Katya's pick for November 3rd, but this month we can post out of order so here I am, on the last Tuesday of Novemeber, posting my version of this cake. I'll be honest, I was not excited to see this cake on the November rotation. If you look at the picture in the book, this is a serious cake. It's the polar opposite of a bundt cake; it requires several different steps, countless dirty dishes, time, and patience. It's also a gorgeous cake! I think it calls to be served on a special, sophisticated occasion. There are many occasions that I deem worthy of this cake; unfortunately, most of my special occasions these days tend to be rather mundane, like two cups of coffee instead of one when I wake up early to study. I pondered skipping this selection altogether, but I always love a chocolate dessert, and I am a very big fan of the idea that you don't need a "special occasion" to celebrate. Why not just make the cake and celebrate life and chocolate?

Once I decided to make the cake, there was no question that the chestnuts would be 86'd. They're really expensive, and there are other nuts that I prefer. I though maybe I'd substitute Nutella or even peanut butter, but Nancy mentioned subbing almond paste and almonds, and I immediately fell in love with that idea. Almonds might just be my favorite nut, I love almond flavor in desserts, and they're less expensive than chestnuts. I substituted thinned almond paste for the sweetened chestnut puree and slivered almonds for the chopped chestnuts.

Here are my notes on making this cake:

I thinned the almond paste with a little bit of vanilla extract and some simple syrup. The original recipe calls for sweetened chestnut puree with vanilla, so I wanted to make sure to add some vanilla to my almond paste. The paste is very stiff and it was impossible to thin with a spoon. I ended up kneeding the liquid into the paste until it was a stirrable consistency. Next time, I think it might be better to do this step in a food processor. I thinned it to the consistency of really thick peanut butter.

I made half a recipe in a loaf pan. As many people noted on the P&Q, the bake time for this cake was considerably longer than the 48 minutes that the recipe states. I ended up baking my loaf for about 62 minutes total. The half recipe worked just fine in the loaf pan, but it did bake up exactly like a loaf -- crack down the center and all! I shaved the crack off when I leveled the cake for assembly and I was still able to get three very even layers.

For the syrup, I used water and brown sugar rather than the brandy as I didn't have any brandy in the house, and I didn't feel like venturing to the liquor store to purchase said brandy. The cake slices into neat layers easily because it's a very dense cake. In my opinion, some sort of syrup to moisten the layers is absolutely essential. It didn't occur to me to add a bit of vanilla or almond extract to the simple syrup, but I might make a note to do so next time.

I didn't have any trouble making the ganache, and be warned, the chocolate caramel combination is positively addictive! I enjoyed the ganache so much more before I added the butter, and I was left wondering if it's possible to cut down the butter in the ganache? My ganache layers between the cake is thin, there are two reasons: 1) I am always, always, always paranoid about running out of frosting 2) I don't like a lot of frosting. It turns out I had plenty of extra frosting, and next time I'll use more between my cake layers, though I used about the 1/2 cup that half a recipe calls for.

The glaze: I used half milk chocolate and half bittersweet because I didn't want a really deep chocolate glaze. Quite a few people mentioned that the glaze went from not thick to too thick in an instant, so I erred on the not thick enough side. At that point, I really wanted to finish making the cake! I think it ended up ok, though!

The verdict? I thought the cake was good . . . I probably would have loved it if someone else had made it. Dudley raved about this dessert . . . but Dudley has yet to say anything even remotely negative about something that I've baked or cooked, so I'm starting to think he might be biased and not such a reliable taste-tester. The almond flavor from the almond paste really comes through in the cake, so if you like almonds, it's a great substitute. I wish I'd thought to toast my almonds before putting them between the layers . . . next time. If you'd like to see the recipe in its original form, you can visit Katya's blog, Second Dinner, or this recipe is also on Epicurious, too.