my house smells like chocolate

This recipe is not only delicious and so simple to make (it only has 4 ingredients!) it will also make your house smell like chocolate.  And who doesn't want that?

Here are the 4 ingredients you'd need:

You'll need to separate the egg whites from the yolks and beat the yolks with half the sugar.  And it will look like this:

A good thing to do before you fully mix the egg yolk mixture and the chocolate mixture is to temper the eggs.  That is, I added a little bit of the chocolate mixture to the egg yolk mixture instead of just dumping the whole lot in.  Otherwise you risk cooking the eggs and you don't want that.

After we baked the cake, we ate it with our friends.  We also added some vanilla bean whipped cream and mixed berries.  Yum!

Note: the cake will look "craggy", but that's just part of it's charm.  Enjoy!

-bb

Here's the recipe!

Flourless Chocolate Cake
adapted from Laura Calder

7 ounces of dark chocolate, chopped
7 ounces of butter, softened
4 eggs, separated
1 cup sugar


Heat the oven to 375°F/190°C. Grease a 8-inch/22 cm springform pan.


Melt the chocolate over a water bath (I went with medium-low heat), then beat in the butter a piece at a time until smooth. In a separate bowl, beat the yolks with half the sugar until thick, pale, and ribbony. 


In another bowl, beat the whites to peaks (I used my stand mixer on high). Scatter over the remaining sugar and beat to a stiff meringue. (Note scattering is important - in my first round, I just dumped the sugar in and I killed the meringue, I basically had egg white soup.  Moral of the story, scatter the sugar in while you're still whisking the egg whites.)


Slowly whisk the chocolate mixture into the yolk mixture (see my note above about tempering). Stir in a spoonful of egg white, then pour the chocolate mixture over the egg whites and gently fold together with a spatula (folding is key because you don't want to lose the air in the eggs). Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake 50 minutes.


Remove from the oven. Run a knife around the outside edge, then let sit until cool. It will sink down and the top will crack, but it's ok. Serve with a big dollop of slightly vanilla bean whipped cream and mixed berries.