Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipe

Flourless Chocolate Cake

July 15, 2006

Wolfgang Puck

My Flourless Chocolate Cake, so dense and rich that it's almost like a sublime fudge, is an excellent choice not only because it's so easy to make well in advance but also because it offers such decadent pleasure for lovers of chocolate.

Ingredients

8 oz. good-quality bittersweet chocolate, cut into small pieces
4 oz. unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
5 eggs, separated
Pinch of salt
2/3 C. sugar
Powdered sugar, for garnish
Unsweetened whipped cream, for garnish
Fresh raspberries, for garnish

Directions

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour a 10-inch round cake pan. Bring about 1 inch of water to boil in the bottom half of a double boiler or in a medium saucepan. Reduce the heat to a bare simmer. Put the chocolate and butter in the top half of the double boiler or in a heatproof mixing bowl large enough to rest on the rim of the saucepan without the bowl's bottom touching the water. Place the pan or bowl over the simmering water and melt the chocolate and butter, stirring them until blended.

Meanwhile, in another mixing bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, pinch of salt and all but 3 Tbs. of the sugar. Stirring continuously, pour the melted chocolate-butter mixture into the egg yolks until thoroughly combined. In a third, clean bowl, put the egg whites. With an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the egg whites until they form soft peaks that droop slightly when the beaters are lifted out. Still beating at medium speed, gradually sprinkle in the remaining sugar, continuing to beat the egg whites until they form stiff but not yet dry peaks.

With a rubber spatula, fold a generous dollop of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture, just until a few streaks of white remain. Add the chocolate mixture to the remaining egg whites and gently fold together until thoroughly combined. Pour the mixture into the prepared cake pan. Bake in the preheated oven for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Remove the pan from the oven and immediately invert a cardboard cake round and a wire cake rack on top of it; then, protecting both hands with pot holders or oven mitts and clasping the rack and pan together, invert them to unmold the cake onto the cardboard and rack. Leave the cake to cool to room temperature. Don't worry that its center sinks and cracks slightly. Refrigerate until serving time. Before serving, dust the cake with powdered sugar by spooning some sugar into a fine-meshed sieve held over the cake, then gently tapping the sieve. Cut the cake into wedges and serve with whipped cream and raspberries.

Yield: 1 10-inch cake

(Chef Wolfgang Puck's TV series, "Wolfgang Puck's Cooking Class," airs Sundays and Wednesdays on the Food Network. Also, chef Wolfgang Puck's latest cookbook, Wolfgang Puck Makes It Easy, is now available in bookstores. Write Wolfgang Puck in care of Tribune Media Services Inc., 2225 Kenmore Ave., Suite 114, Buffalo, NY. 14207.)
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