Hi Bold Bakers! Easter is a pretty important holiday in Ireland, my mum would cook lamb
to celebrate the beginning of spring and we would have a big chocolate cake for dessert.
Now one of my Bold Bakers Teah reminded me of a cake I made a few years ago for Easter,
and she makes it for Passover, it is a flourless chocolate cake. It is so good, it’s like
a fudgy brownie cake. The recipe can be found on BiggerBolderBaking.com along with lots
of my other spring and Easter recipes so make sure you check it out. Okay, let’s get started
in a large bowl. Add in butter, and chocolate. So now what you want to do is melt these two
ingredients together, now you can do this gently in the microwave or you can do it over
a ban-marie. So now this is lovely and melted, you don't ever want to get chocolate too hot
because it has a tendency to burn so like I said be careful as you melt it. Now into
this I'm going to add in some sugar, salt, and vanilla extract. And then just whisk all
these ingredients together. So the reason that we’re adding this in now, before the
eggs is so the sugar can actually cool down the chocolate before we add in our eggs. So
my go-to chocolate is 72% cocoa solids. The reason I love to use it is because it bittersweet.
So you get a little bit of sweetness but you also get that lovely kind of rich bitterness
from the chocolate. It works really well for this cake. Okay, lovely. Now that this is
cooled down a little bit we’re going to add in our egg yolks. And then just go ahead
and whisk them in. So these are our egg yolks, now we kept our whites separate because we’re
going to whip them up in a few minutes and then fold it into this cake. And the egg whites
are actually what leavens the cake and makes it rise. And it’s one of the reasons why
you don't have to have flour in this cake. Okay this is looking good, now for a little
bit more chocolate, I'm going to sift over some cocoa powder. Now you know that I love
all of my Bold Bakers equally, and I always try and accommodate my vegetarian and vegan
Bold Bakers, but unfortunately for this cake, you can’t substitute the eggs because they're
such an important ingredient. But make sure you check my website because I've got loads
of egg-free recipes there. Okay, this is looking good. And then go again with your whisk and
just mix it in. Now a lot of people ask me about cocoa powder, I use unsweetened cocoa
powder, you can use Dutch process, I find that it can be a little bit bitter, sometimes,
but just use something that’s sugar-free for sure, so it doesn't mess with the sugar
in your recipe. Okay this mix is looking pretty good, I'm going to set it aside now and we’re
going to whip up our egg whites. Now egg whites whip up best when they're at room temperature.
They just get lovely and fluffy, so take them out of the fridge, let them sit for a few
hours, and they'll just whip up so much better. I'm going to add these into my stand mixer
but you can also use an electric hand mixer to whip up your egg whites. So now I'm going
to turn my machine on to like a medium slow speed and just whip up the egg whites really
gently. So here's a funny little tip I've never told you before, and actually the same
thing applies to yeast. What you want to do is just wake it up gently for around 2 minutes,
whip it up on a low speed, same when you're making a bread dough, and then crank it up
and let all that air get into it. But those few minutes by itself on slow just wake everything
up and get them activated. So this is good, it’s getting a little bit foamy, it’s
been around two minutes, now what I'm going to do is crank up the speed and just let it
whip until it reaches stiff peaks. So here’s a little secret of things that happen in kitchens,
when I worked in a Michelin star restaurant we used to make macaroons. And we used to
leave our egg whites sitting out, not for one day or two days, but three, four, even
five days at room temperature in the kitchen in the restaurant. And it just makes for much
better flavor, texture, and they whip up so much better. I know it sound kind of crazy,
but I ate them and I'm still standing, and they were absolutely delicious. Okay this
is looking good, the egg whites have whipped up really nice and stiff, now it’s time
to take this and fold it into our chocolate mixture. So here we’re going to do something
called introducing. And what that means is to add one mixture into another. Because the
egg whites a different texture, you add a little bit into the chocolate mix, fold that
in carefully and then you can add in the rest. It just means that you'll fold it in so much
better and evenly. Now the aim of the game here is to keep all of those lovely bubbles
that you created because that’s what going to make our cake rise. And one tip as well,
I'm full of tips and tricks today for some reason. But one tip as well is to use a metal
spoon with a thin edge, because it won’t knock out all of your air. If you use a wooden
spoon or a spatula, they're kind of thick and chunky, you want to use a metal spoon.
So our first bit of egg white is mixed in, now I'm going to go ahead and add in all the
rest. By adding that little bit in first it loosens up your mix and makes it easier to
fold in the rest of your egg whites. Oh my gosh, this definitely looks like a brownie
batter doesn't it? Really fluffy and rich and dark. That's why I'm telling you want
to use that bittersweet chocolate. It just takes this cake to a whole other level. Okay,
just keep going until you don't see your egg whites anymore, but don't over mix it. This
is gorgeous, now I'm going to take this and put it straight into my tin. So here I have
a 9 inch spring form tin, or a cheesecake tin, and it has been buttered and lined so
we can get our cake out of there easily. Then just go ahead and scoop your fluffy chocolate
cake into your tin. Look at how thick and gorgeous that is. Believe me when you see
this cake being cut you are definitely going to want to make it. Flatten out the top with
your spatula a little bit, as you can see this makes a pretty big cake. So perfect for
Easter or Passover, when family and friends are around. And this cake is ready for the
oven. Bake this cake off at 350º degree Fahrenheit or 180º Celsius for roughly 40-45 minutes.
Now just a little note about this cake, you don't want to over-bake it, you want it to
be all that fudgy, yummy chocolatey-ness in the middle. So don't go longer than 45 minutes.
So while my cake is in the oven I'm going to make good use of my time and decorate eggs
for the top of my cake. Now these look so pretty for Easter, all you do is get a little
bowl of water, and into this I'm going to add a little bit of blue food coloring. You
can add any color that you want your eggs, that's totally up fine. Or you want them lots
of different colors, go nuts. Into this I'm going to add in a little bit of vinegar and
some oil. So now the oil gives your eggs a little bit of a marbled effect, it’s really
pretty when they're finished. Okay, this is the blue that I want, then I'm going to take
some hard boiled eggs, make sure that they're white shelled eggs so it'll take the dye better,
and dip it into my dye. And you just want to roll them around in there, and just let
them soak up the color. Keep them moving so the color is even all the way throughout.
And it just takes a few minutes. And you'll see the eggs take the dye pretty fast. There
you go, look at that. Gorgeous. Then I'm going to dip another one. Dip as many as you want,
I'm going to do 3 for the top of my cake. As you can see I made my eggs look kind of
like robins’ eggs, that beautiful kind of teal bluish color. But to give my eggs a little
bit more pizzazz, I'm going to add a little bit of gold edible luster on the outside.
Just to make them sparkle that little bit more. If you don't have it, just leave it
out, they're still going to look gorgeous. Perfect. Okay, I’m going to set these aside,
make sure that they're totally dry, and let’s go check on our cake. So my cake took exactly
45 minute, now come here to me because I want you to see exactly what it’s supposed to
look like when it comes out of the oven. If you press down in the center, you can feel
that it’s a little bit soft under your finger which means that there's fudgy goodness underneath
there. You don't want to over overcook this cake because it’ll dry out. Then also, the
nature of this cake is that it will sink a little bit when it comes out of the oven,
so if it falls or cracks even, that is totally fine, it’s just what it does, it’ll still
taste great. Now I’m going to set this aside, let it cool down, and then we can decorate
it. So my cake is on my serving platter, now here’s the beauty of this cake. It tastes
even better if you make it the day before. Let it rest, let all those flavors marry together,
and then you'll have it ready for Easter or Passover. So here I have a bowl of chocolate
ganache, this is great to serve on top of cakes and it gives it a really beautiful,
professional finish, the recipe for this can be found on BiggerBolderBaking.com, all it
is, is chocolate and a little bit of cream. So go ahead and pour it onto the top of your
cake, and then with a spatula, just move it around and run it over the top. This is my
kind of cake decorating, something that doesn't need a huge amount of technique but still
looks beautiful in the end. Gorgeous. There's our ganache. So to give the effect of creating
a little nest for our eggs, I have some grated chocolate, and I’m going to sprinkle that
in the center of the cake. It kind of looks like little bits of twigs. And then, we are
going to place our beautiful robins’ eggs in top. Look at that, how gorgeous is that,
and how simple as well. So if you think this cake looks good now, wait and I show you what's
on the inside. Just check that out. What did I promise you? Brownie fudgy chocolate goodness.
This cake is to die for. My favorite part of the job. So here’s the thing about this
cake. Cut yourself a big slice, pop it into the microwave for around 20 seconds, and it
is heaven on earth when it comes out. The ganache is kind of melted, this cake is insanely
good. Now matter what holiday you celebrate, this fudgy chocolate cake is the perfect way
to welcome the arrival of spring. Thank you so much for watching, I hope you enjoyed this
episode, and I’ll see you back here really soon for more Bigger Bolder Baking.