Black Forest Cake

Ingredients

(4) large eggs

(3/4) cup – flour

(1/2) cup – sugar

(4oz) bitter sweet chocolate (60% cocoa content)

(2) TBL spoons – corn starch

(2) TBL spoons – sugar (this is separate from ½ cup of sugar)

pinch of salt

(1) pint – heavy cream (be sure the heavy cream and container are very cold)

(2) TBL spoons – powdered sugar

(2) tsp – vanilla extract

(1) jar – maraschino cherries (separate cherries from juice into separate bowls)

Will need 1-2 bars of dark chocolate to create shavings, using a vegetable peeler

Directions

Step 1 – Making the Chocolate Cake

1. Separate egg whites from yolks (make sure there are no traces of yolk in whites, otherwise it will be difficult to beat into a white mixtures)

2. Beat egg yolks with a ½ cup of sugar, until you get a white mixture

3. Melt chocolate into a Bain-Marie where you have chocolate container on top of boiling water

4. Once chocolate is melted, add to yolk mixture.  Just add a little to tempure egg yolks so they don’t coo, then add the rest

5. Beat egg whites with (2) TBL spoons of sugar and pinch of salt until you get a firm white mixture

6. Make sure there are no traces of egg yolk in whites and that your beater is clean and dry

7. Add pinch of salt to egg whites

8. Once egg whites starts to firm up, add the 2 TBL spoons of sugar

9. Mix corn starch with flour and sift into different container

10. Incorporate egg whites and flour and corn starch into chocolate mixture

11. Now going to add some of egg white and flour into chocolate mixture

Step 2 – Baking the Chocolate Cake

1. Get baking pan ready (using a 13x9 pan in video)

2. Butter the pan and place parchment paper on pan

3. Butter parchment paper and place chocolate mixture in pan

4. Pre-heat oven to 360°

5. Bake for 20-25 minutes

6. To check if the cake is cooked, press on top – it should feel firm

Gently move to rack so it cools down

Step 3 – Preparing the Cream

1. Now beat the heavy cream into whipped cream by mixing with powdered sugar and vanilla extract

2. Make sure the heavy cream, container and beater heads are cold by placing them in the refrigerator for a few hours before making the whipped cream

3. The consistency of the whipped cream should be firm

4. Cover heavy cream with plastic wrap and put in refrigerator until ready to use

Step 4 – Other things to Prepare

1. Make chocolate shavings by shaving chocolate bar with vegetable peeler

2. Cut maraschino cherries into small pieces

Step 5 – Assembling the Black Forest Cake

1. Now that the cake is at room temperature, use a glass to cut small circular pieces of cake for individual sizes

2. Use circular pieces for cake, but save excess to make extra in glass

3. Now going to assemble the Black Forest

4. First wet cake with syrup, then add whipped cream and cherries, and repeat a few times.  Then cover whole cake with the whipped cream and chocolate shavings

5. Now going to decorate top of the Black Forest, so going to pipe some whipped cream on top using a piping bag and piping tip.

6. To use piping bag, first insert piping tip inside bag, then cut edge to be able to pipe; then turn over in hands and fill with some cream. Use thumbs to push cream down; turn piping bag up and push down cream

7. Put cream circles around top of cake and add a cherry in the middle

8. Place in refrigerator for 4-hours so it cools down and cake absorbs syrup

For Leftovers of Cake

1. Take some cake and crumble it in a cup

2. Add some syrup

3. Add whipped cream

4. Add cherries

5. Crumble more cake

6. Add syrup

7. Decorate with some chocolate shavings

Note: If you don’t like cherries, you can replace with other fruit (ie: raspberries, and for juice you can replace with jam that has been diluted in some water)