rich, moist, nutty, cinnamony , orangy ……..  this is one of my all time favourite cakes

I have been making this cake for a few years now and have tinkered around with the original Anna Del Conte recipe and I hope the grand dame wont mind as I think my method adds a touch more body and is very easy, provided you do have an electric whisk or failing that bionic arms as it involves making a meringue. If you do not the cake will not fail, it will just be more dense and “fudgy”. The method is fun and involves blitzing up dark chocolate into chocolate “crumbs” which then melt into the cake as it bakes. Here I’ve served it with white chocolate ice cream.

INGREDIENTS

• 225g Good Dark Chocolate broken into chunks or the professional chocolate drops 72% cocoa content please.  (ciocolata negru)
• 225g Hazlenuts (alune de padure)
• 225g Walnuts (nuci)
• 6 x Eggs separated  (oua separate)
• 200g Sugar (zahar)
• Orange Zest (coaja de portocale)  x 1
• Vanilla Essence (esentia de vanilia) 1 tsp
• 60ml Something alcoholic (Whisky or Rum or Cognac – I like Cognac)
• 2 tsp Cinnamon (scortisoara)  and in this recipe it works
• 100g melted butter (unt topit)

GADGETS & GIZMOS

A loose bottomed tin 20cm diameter (will make quite a nice high cake) or a 23cm diameter will make a slightly flatter one. I also make them in the paper smallish/medium pannetone cases which are cute.

HOW TO

Prepare your tin. Line with baking paper and a little oil.

Pulse the chocolate in a blender until it is grainy. You want it looking like coffee grains.

Next pulse the nuts. Again you want them with some texture not as a powder but if the pieces are too large the cake will disintegrate when you cut it

Make a meringue with the egg whites and sugar by whisking on full power until the meringue is glossy and shiny and when the bowl is tipped upside down the meringue stays in place. Go on try it!

Mix the egg yolk, melted butter, chocolate, nuts and alcohol, spices and orange zest to make a kind of gorgeous smelling chocolate alcohol spice concrete mix – Roman style after all.

Now lighten it by folding in the meringue softly softly starting with a small quantityof meringue as a “starter”.  Reserve one large spoonful of meringue!

Pour into the prepared tins. It will look too pale and you will wonder if you did something wrong. Dont worry – its because the chocolate still has to melt.

When almost done (a cocktail stick comes out clean) take out and with the one spoonful of meringue add a spoonful of water to thin down and create meringue glue. Paint the cake top which should be crusty and might have cracked in a pleasingly artistic way. (!) Now sprinkle on sugar so it looks snowy. Pop back in the oven for only two minutes – just enough for the sugar to stick. If it caramelizes…don’t worry…just call it your special touch!