Chocolate & orange cake

This creation combines a dark chocolate cake with fresh zest of oranges along with a few chocolate chips in it, topped with some homemade candied orange, nutella and finally dipped in a gourmet chocolate glaze.

You can use this basic chocolate cake recipe for a larger cake too.

Ingredients

For the chocolate cake

Yields 12 mini cakes

Butter melted 40gm

Plain flour 60gm

Baking powder 4gm

Cocoa powder 16gm

Eggs 2

Caster sugar 100gm

Almond meal 40gm

Callebaut dark chocolate(54.4%) melted 80gm

Cream 60ml

Egg white 60gm

Half an orange rind

Salt 3gm

For the candied orange

1 orange

Caster sugar 125gm

Water 250gm

For the gourmet glaze

Dark chocolate 240gm

Neutral oil 50ml

For the final finishing

Nutella 40gm

Macadamia 20gm

Candied orange strips

Method:

For the candied orange

1.Slit the orange into quarters without cutting through the pulp, peel off the skin slowly preserving its shape.

2.Now place the orange peels in a small sauce pan, cover it with cold water and bring it to a boil. Once the water has started to boil, discard the water by straining the orange peel into a collander.

3. Repeat this process four times, starting with cold water everytime. You will notice a slight colour change everytime you strain the water away.

4. Once you have blanched the oranges 4 times, place them aisde.

5. Combine the water and sugar in a small saucepan and bring it to a boil, once you have the syrup boiling add in the orange skins and allow to simmer for about 5 minutes. Take it off the flame and place the saucepan away untill the contents cools down.

6. Bring the saucepan back on the flame, this time with the peels in the syrup and bring to a boil, and simmer for about 5 minutes. Transfer the contents into a small container and pour the syrup over it. Allow it to cool and steep in the syrup preferably overnight.

For the chocolate cake

1. Pre heat the oven to 165 degrees centigrade, grease the silicon mould with oil and place aside.

2.Warm the chocolate in a microwave bowl, beware not to go beyond 30 seconds at a stretch as the chocolate will burn if left for a longer duration.

3. In seperate bowls, melt the butter and heat the cream. Add the warm cream to the partially melted chocolate and mix with a spatula.

4. Add the melted butter to this chocolate mix ad place aside.

6. Combine the dry ingredients together in add the zest to it.

7. Gradually fold the dry ingredients into the fluffy egg mix, add it in three intervals combining gradually to retain the aeration created.

8. Add the chocolate mix to this, slowly by folding it into the egg mix.

9. Whip the whites separately to soft peaks in a dry bowl and fold it into the batter gradually.

10. Pipe the cake batter into the greased moulds and fill them half way, you can add in some chocolate in between before filling them up 3/4th the height of the mould. I added a small about of butter on the cake before baking, you can skip this step if you prefer.

11 .Bake this in the oven for about 15-17 minutes depending on the type of oven used.

12. Once they are baked de-mould them onto a cooling rack.

For the gourmet glaze

1. Melt the chocolate to 40 degrees centigrade, add in the neutral oil and bring the temperature down to 30 degrees centigrade.

FOR THE FINAL FINISHING

1.Pipe a small dollop of Nutella onto the cakes, cut strips of the candied orange and place them on either sides sticking them onto the Nutella, I used a macadamia too in the middle of the peel.

2. Using a knife pierce the cake from the bottom side of it just enough to hold it firmly.

3. Dip the cakes into the glaze, covering just till the corners of each side and leaving the base.

4. Now place the glazed cakes on a grease proof paper and allow it to set for about 5 minutes. In the meanwhile, while it is setting cut think strips of the candied orange and garnish them.

PS : Placing the mini cakes in the freezer for about 15 minutes just before dipping will help you handle it better.

If you are making a larger cake, you can arrange the candied orange peel over the surface by sticking them with Nutella and pouring the glaze over the cake covering the entire surface.

(Doing this on a cooling rack will help, as it will help get rid of the excess coating from the cake)

Enjoy 😋

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