I have been threatening to make this tart by Helen for months now, ever since she first posted about it. It was the novel (to me) idea of having a healthy carrot and oat crust, that attracted me to the recipe. Also, with a filling of silverbeet (she used rainbow chard in the original), eggs and a restrained hand with the parmesan grater.. how could you go wrong with that combination?

When I finally made it for our dinner the other day, my only regret was that it had taken me so long to bake this fantastic tart. The crust despite being sufficiently healthy, was very tart-like, so you weren’t left feeling as though something had been compromised in terms of not having the usual shortcrust pastry. I believe, no buttery-tart-lover having tasted this, would have felt in the least bit duped.

The filling was bound by egg, but only just so (especially since the eggs I used were smaller), without it tasting like a frittata or a quiche, which B definitely isn’t a huge fan of. In fact, the end result was so delicious and made me feel so virtuous that I even went for seconds. (Thank you for the recipe, Helen! Next on my list is that award-winning chilli of yours 😀 )

Of course, after virtuosity, comes cake.

I have made a version of Eve’s chocolate cake many times before, but this time was sorely tested by the lack of proper equipment in my kitchen at home. Despite this, the rapid disappearance of the cake once it was assembled, is evidence enough of it’s success (or our greed).

What I love about this cake, apart from it being a completely flourless and nut-free chocolate cake, with minimal amounts of butter and added sugar, is the genius of having a cake topping made from the reserved unbaked cake mixture. That’s two-for-the-price-of-one, as far as any cake-making effort is concerned! If I hadn’t known that this cake was named after Damien Pignolet’s friend Eve Knottenbelt, I would’ve concluded that this cake was so called, because of it’s simple beauty, it’s grace and purity in flavour.

Eve’s Chocolate Cake :
(from French by Damien Pignolet)

360g bittersweet chocolate, chopped into small pieces
50g soft unsalted butter
12 x 65g eggs, separated
30g caster sugar
20g caster sugar
a little grated bittersweet chocolate and cocoa, to decorate

Grease a 26-28cm springform cake tin and line the base and sides with baking paper. Preheat the oven to 150’C.

Melt the chocolate in a bowl over a bain-marie of hot (not boiling) water then work in the soft butter.

Beat the egg yolks with the 30g of sugar until pale. Combine them with the melted chocolate and butter.

Beat the egg whites until stiff but not dry (preferably in a copper bowl with a wire whisk), and then beat in the 20g of sugar until stiff.

Beat 1/4 of the egg-white mixture into the chocolate and then fold this gently but thoroughly back into the remaining egg-white mixture.

Transfer 1/4 of the cake mixture into a bowl and refrigerate. Pour the balance of the mixture into the prepared tin and bake for 30-40 minutes. It should remain slightly moist in the centre; to test, press the centre with your finger after 30 minutes – it should hold the indentation.

Remove from the oven and turn out directly onto a serving platter. Remove the springform ring and base. Leave to cool completely. The cake will collapse to leave a crater in the centre. Fill the crater with the reserved mixture and scatter with the chocolate. Dust lightly with cocoa and serve with whipped cream.

[Note : Eve’s chocolate cake is my submission to Lorraine’s Chocolate Cake challenge. I’m afraid I don’t have a “best ever” chocolate cake recipe, as my ultimate cake varies from day to day, but this one is definitely up there. 🙂 ]

There is a particular section at work that seems to defeat most people. I haven’t been working in this restaurant for terribly long and already I’ve seen more people come and go, than any other place I’ve worked in. The latest casualty, was a bit of a surprise to us all, considering he was a lovely guy and seemed to be going really well. One morning when he was supposed to be in for a shift, he rang up saying he didn’t want to work here anymore because he wasn’t enjoying it.

What happens when someone does this is, they look like a complete wanker (for lack of a better word) for starters. Also, the recently departed usually forces everyone else to pick up the slack by having to work extra shifts.

I mean, sure, it’s a tough kitchen. One of the toughest I’ve ever been in, and I know I would struggle too, if I was working on any section but pastry. So you don’t blame people when they decide the place isn’t for them. Rather, what annoys me is the way in which they choose to leave. At least the guy mentioned above rang up. Most just don’t bother turning up the next day, after a difficult shift the evening before. When they pack away their knives, saying that they’re taking them home to be sharpened, it’s highly likely they won’t be back. The one that really takes the cake is the guy who arrived for a trial, and having decided after two hours that he wasn’t interested in working here, just kind of gathered his tools up and disappeared. No thank you, goodbye, nothing.

Does this happen in any other industry? If not, what is wrong with this industry! Forget menu planning – maybe they need to teach How to Leave your Place of Employment In a Professional Manner 101 at cooking school.

All this ranting has left me without much idea of what to say about the dessert pictured above. The hunter-gatherer instinct is strong in the boy, even if it only extends as far as bringing home sushi and the occasional pretzel from our favourite German bakery. A couple of days ago, he came home with a handful of green apples. We both love apples in either tarts or crumbles, and this time I thought we could incorporate the best of both worlds. Yesterday evening, he cracked open a bottle of wine, I put on Nina Simone, made pasta, we watched Son of Rambow, and later there was apple crumble tart for dessert. One of those good days… 🙂

For the longest time, silly me always thought a frangipane tart was one scented with frangipanis. I don’t know how it happened, but somehow the idea got stuck in my head that the essence of little white flowers flavoured the tart, and as a result, I was always disappointed by the lack of discernible floral tones in any slice of frangipane I tasted.

It was when I started learning to cook, that I discovered that frangipane is actually an almond based pastry cream commonly used for filling tarts. One of my favourite fruit additions to such a tart is slices of slow-cooked quince, or a generous scattering of fresh raspberries. Inspired by a cherry scone I ate a couple of days ago, I decided to line the base of this tart, with glace cherries and dried sour cherries : a combination of sticky, juicy and chewy cherries.

For a better fruit : frangipane ratio, I wouldn’t usually make the tart as high as this one, but I found a lovely deep-dishy tin that I wanted to use, amongst B’s mom’s collection of baking things – it had a pattern on the bottom, so I’m guessing it’s actually a cake tin.

We had this tart when it was still warm from the oven, with scoops of vanilla ice-cream, and it was still so good eaten on it’s own, the very next day.