Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Black Forest Cake

Black Forest cake is one of my favourite cakes. Whenever we used to go to a cake shop during my college days, I always asked for Black Forest Cake. And one day I was lazily turning the pages of a recipe book. And there I found this recipe. To my surprise it was very simple and easy to make. So I became very enthusiastic and immediately set out shopping for the items I need.

It is basically a German cake called Schwarzwälderkirschtorte, which means Black Forest Cherry Cake. It is made up of layers of chocolate cake with Kirsch, whipped cream, sour cherries and chocolate curls. It seems it was founded in late 16th century in Black Forest region of Germany soon after Chocolate was founded. This region is known for its sour cherries and Kirsch or Kirschwasser.

Ingredients:
For the cake
All-purpose flour - 21/4 cup
Sugar - 2 cups
Unsweetened cocoa powder - 3/4 cup
Baking powder - 2 t.sp
6 large  eggs
Vanilla Essence - 1 1/2 t.sp

For the Frosting & Filling
Pitted sour cherries - 1 bottle (785 gms)
Sugar - 1 cup
Cornstarch - 1/4 cup
Heavy whipping cream - 3 cups
Sugar - 3/4 cup

Method
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour two 9 inch, round, cake pans.
In a large bowl, combine together flour, cocoa, baking powder. Sieve together and keep aside.
Break eggs one at a time into a bowl and then transfer it into the mixing bowl.
Beat the Castor Sugar and eggs till nice creamy and fluffy.
Mix the vanilla essence.
Fold in the dry ingredients with a light hand.
Pour batter into pans.
Bake till the cake is done i.e. until a knife inserted in centers comes out clean. Takes about 20 min. Cool.

Drain cherries, reserving the juice. Keep about 1/4 cup of the reserved juice aside. Combine the rest of the reserved juice, 1 cup sugar and cornstarch in a saucepan. Cook over low heat until thickened, stirring constantly. Cool. Mix together the drained cherries.
Combine whipping cream and confectioner's sugar in a bowl. Beat with an electric mixer at high speed until stiff peaks form.
Sprinkle both the layers on the topside with 6 tbsp of the reserved juice.
Spread with 1 cup frosting; top with 3/4 cup cherry topping. Top with second cake layer. Frost top & side of cake.
And decorate the top the way you like. I filled the frosting into pastry bag fitted with star decorator tip and piped it around top of cake. And topped it with cherries.
Sprinkle with grated chocolate. Keep it in the fridge. Serve after about 3 to 4 hrs or later.

And this special treat is going to FIC : Brown hosted by Sunshinemom of Tongue Ticklers.
And to the event AFAM : Cherries hosted by Rachel of Tangerines Kitchen. AFAM was initially hosted by dear Maheswari of Beyond the Usual

19 comments:

  1. hey it looks just like store bought cake.. very professional. hats off!

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  2. I would have loved to have a dig at it! Like Mahimaa said, it looks shop bought. Thank you for letting it march in the brown parade at FIC:)

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  3. HI. This is my first visit here. You have a yummy blog. Hope you don't mind I added you to my bloglist.
    Please feel free to visit my blog and leave comments.
    Happy cooking!!

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  4. Thank you very much Mahimaa and Harini. I am obliged.
    Dear Sanhita that was very nice of you. Sure will visit your blog.
    Thank you.

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  5. Iam drooling over. Looks awesome, tempting, alluring, lucious and delicious. Can i have a bite please?

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  6. Your black forest cake looks perfect! :)

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  7. Hi.. looks really yummy & fantastic,,,... nice entry..

    First time here. u have a wonderful & Innovative blog... keep it up... all recipes are really yummy...
    Added u in my blog roll...

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  8. Welcome Laavanya, Kitchen Flavours, Sripriya. Thanks a lot for ur sweet comments.

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  9. Oh god..fabulous Black forest cake...am drooling on...looks really excellent, great job..

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  10. no butter or milk in the cake ??

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  11. hi,it looks awesome... inever prepared cake in microwave by this i will try...

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  12. looks delicious and very tempting... :)

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  13. Wow that looks s good and you make it sound simple too.Nice blog.

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  14. A fav flavour of mine too but never got down to making it till now..yours looks very professional and gorgeous.Thanks for the netry.

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  15. Looks yum..this is my favourite..had been to black forest recently and had it there as well.

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  16. Looks great....Does this cake has butter or oil?

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  17. I had tried your cake.. The batter was dry.. Can you tell me if we need to add butter and milk to the cake flour mix? I am sure there is something missing in the ingredient.

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  18. To answer to the queries here in the comments, it is a "Butterless Cake". Maybe I had not elaborated on the step of making the batter clearly before and hence these queries. Now I have elaborated on the steps of making the batter. Hope your doubt is cleared now.

    I will also try to post a newer post of this cake with a much elaborated method.

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  19. Hi Lakshmi

    I had retried the updated recipe. The cake batter consistency was good and I had finally made the Black Forest cake.

    Thank you for updating your recipe and your quick response.

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