Issue #252: Two Flourless Chocolate Cakes

Holiday Traditions, Passover Chocolate Cakes You'll Want to Eat Year Round

Holidays are about tradition, especially when it comes to food.

Our friends across the street have hosted the neighborhood for an Easter Sunday brunch for more than 40 years. People who have moved away come back to see old friends. There’s always a ham from a local smokehouse. Signature biscuits, salads, and desserts are brought by various cooks in the area. This will be our third time attending. (I’ve been on biscuit and dinner roll duty.) Already we look forward to it.

Last year at the Stephensons’ Easter Brunch the peeps found their way to the cupcakes. Made with regular flour, these chocolate cupcakes were appropriately kosher for Easter, not Passover.

I can’t imagine a Jewish holiday without my mother’s matzo ball soup (see Issue #70) or chopped liver. Last week I wrote about the Medieval Spanish matzos I’ve been making for Passover for three decades (Issue #251).

One of my go-to Passover desserts has always been Chocolate Cloud Cake, a rich, Passover appropriate, flourless dessert the late cookbook author and friend Richard Sax shared with me back in 1994, just before he published it in his masterwork Classic Home Desserts. I still have his original photocopy tucked into the stained pages of his book. This was before most people used email or had heard the term PDF.

Sadly, it was also before the drugs were available that would have prevented Richard dying of complications due to AIDS the following year. Baking Richard’s cake has been a way to preserve the fond memories I have of cooking and eating with him. For a short time, before his energy level was too erratic to plan, we had a little downtown cooking quartet—with Marion Nestle and our friend Evelynne (Issue #240). Every couple of months we’d rotate to someone else’s home for dinner. It was likely at one of those meals where I first tried his Chocolate Cloud Cake. It’s an impressive dessert, not just at Passover, but any time of year.

RECIPE: Richard’s Chocolate Cloud Cake

Serves 8

• 8 ounces (225g) 60% to 72% dark chocolate, chopped

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

• 6 large eggs, at room temperature

• 1 cup sugar

• 2 tablespoons brandy or Grand Marnier

• Finely grated zest of 1 orange (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line the bottom of an 8-inch springform pan with parchment paper, but do not butter either the pan or the paper.

In a small saucepan, combine the chocolate and butter and set over a very low burner to melt, stirring constantly so nothing burns. When almost everything has melted, remove the pan from the heat and continue stirring until smooth.

Into 2 large bowls, separate the yolks and whites of 4 of the eggs. To the yolks, add the 2 remaining whole eggs along with 1/2 cup of the sugar, whisking to combine. Slowly whisk in the warm chocolate mixture, brandy, and orange zest, if using.

With a handheld mixer, beat the whites until light and foamy. Gradually add the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar and beat to glossy, silken peaks, about 5 minutes total. Using a large rubber spatula, gently fold about 1/4 of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture to lighten it and then fold in the remaining whites. Transfer the batter into the prepared pan, leveling the top with an offset spatula.

Set the pan in the preheated oven and bake until the top is puffed and cracked and the center is no longer wobbly, 35 to 40 minutes. Don’t overbake. Remove the cake to a wire rack. The center will sink as it cools completely. To serve, fill the crater with whipped cream (see below).

The Chocolate Cloud Cake comes out of the oven fully risen and puffed, but sinks to form a crater as it cools.

Traditions also change.

A few weeks ago, I stumbled across a recipe for a different flourless chocolate cake from another cookbook author and friend, Pati Jinich, host of the acclaimed Pati’s Mexican Table and the James Beard Award winning La Frontera series. A sort of cross between a cake and flan that you make in the blender, it was so easy and delicious, I thought, “I’ll make it for Passover this year.”

Pati’s Chocolate Almond Cake

If I’m being honest, the reason the recipe first jumped out at me was that I’ve had half a can’s worth of condensed milk in the fridge for a couple of years. (Yes, you read that right.) I just couldn’t throw it away. I can now say with certainty that condensed milk keeps forever. And this recipe called for one can plus an additional amount equal to what I had been saving. It was meant to be.

Without having to whip any egg whites, the recipe couldn’t be easier. The result is dense and chocolatey—another great option for a chocolate dessert any time of year. And a new tradition, perhaps.

As someone who was always experimenting with new recipes for future columns or books, I know Richard wouldn’t mind me wanting to try another flourless chocolate cake. He was always testing and tweaking recipes, talking to chefs for tips, hunting down new ideas for desserts. This open spirit is captured in the pages of Classic Home Desserts.

He also loved meeting new people. We became fast friends on an olive oil junket to Tunisia. Had he met Pati, perhaps on a trip to her beloved Mexico, I’m sure he would have loved her and her cake as much as I do.

Pati’s Chocolate Almond Cake, unadorned. A dusting of powdered sugar would suffice, but who doesn’t love whipped cream?

RECIPE: Pati’s Chocolate Almond Cake

Serves 10

• 1 cup unsalted butter

• 6 ounces 60% to 72% dark chocolate, chopped

• 4 large eggs

• One 14-ounce can, plus 1/4 cup, sweetened condensed milk

• 1 1/2 cups almond flour

• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

• Pinch kosher salt

• 1/4 cup boiling water, hot coffee, some brandy or rum, or a combination

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter a 9-inch round springform pan and cover the bottom with parchment paper. Butter the parchment.

In a small saucepan, combine the chocolate and butter and set over a very low burner to melt, stirring constantly so nothing burns. When almost everything has melted, remove the pan from the heat and continue stirring until smooth.

Combine the eggs and condensed milk in a blender and pulse to combine. Add the melted chocolate and whir again. Add the almond flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt, and run the blender to combine. Add the boiling or combination of liquids and let it whir one last time.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake for 40 minutes, until top has risen and is springy to the touch. Remove from the oven and cool completely on a wire rack before unmolding. Top with whipped cream (see below) and dust with powdered sugar before serving.

RECIPE: Sweetened Whipped Cream

• 1 1/2 cups heavy cream, chilled

• 3 tablespoons confectioner’s sugar

• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract or paste

In a chilled bowl, combine the cream, sugar, and vanilla and beat with a whisk or electric mixer just until stiff. Don’t over mix or it will curdle and separate. I actually prefer to underwhip my cream so it is soft and silky.

As I was writing this newsletter, my sister Carrie sent me a photo and recipe of yet another Passover chocolate cake she had just made, said to be as good as anything you’d eat any time of year. Perhaps we’ll have yet another new chocolate cake tradition next year. Chag sameach to all.