This is love. Found on de Maisonneuve just past Concordia University, Thursday last.

Heat + humidity = S in her happy place!

I thought it was a wonderful omen of fabulous things to come… and instead, I began a weekend off the rails. It happens!

The pluses: Temptation Cake. Lake swimming. Loons. Visitors. Lasagna. Good nights’ sleep.

The minuses: ooh… let’s not even go there. Just a few highlights, though: the promise of internet? Denied by construction that took out the bridge. Boo!

And while we’re at it… when did I get so destructive? In Van, I wrecked a freezer full of my friend’s food. In Wentworth, I scratched the new stove and broke two of my newly-introduced second cousin’s shot glasses—which he had brought up with tequila on the day we met. He’s trying to be all friendly, and then I had to go and smash it. Luckily, he wasn’t there to see it, I’ll replace them tomorrow, and he doesn’t speak English so he’ll never be the wiser by happening upon my blog.

So let’s accentuate the positive again, and talk cake: Temptation is a great cake. It tastes light, but it’s anything but. It fits into my healthy manifesto by way of “into every life, an occasional indulgence must fall”.

(I’m recycling this pic from earlier because I have never made a more perfect cake than in June, for Angela… and out of my kitchen without the same implements it still rocked, but it wasn’t quite as stunning as that little beauty.)

What I would say about this cake is, a little goes a long way. Serve with coffee. Use the BEST quality and most bittersweet chocolate you can. Really, the best quality ingredients you can.

Case in point: that cocoa powder is Callebaut’s bittersweet, beautifully, richly, wonderfully dark. You can smell the depth. And it was SO CHEAP (relative to Callebaut in Calgary)!! Montrealers out there—I got my chocolate and cocoa for an absolute song at Milano’s in Little Italy (6862 Boul. St-Laurent).

I also picked wild raspberries… but just for garnish since I didn’t have enough time to pick enough for the whole recipe.

SO: once you’ve acquired gorgeous ingredients and a little bit of time*, praise the universe (and Dorie Greenspan) for such wonderful miracles as the combination of raspberries and chocolates…

*OK, OK, admittedly, most people don’t want to spend a few hours in their kitchen banging out such things as a heavenly cake, but it’s SO. WORTH IT.

Chocolat Tentation—Chocolate Temptation

reproduced (with modifications) from Dorie Greenspan’s Paris Sweets (Clarkson Potter, 2002), 155-7, which reproduces it with modifications from Ladurée—0f course!

Ingredients: The Cake

• 1/3 cup (30 grams) Dutch-processed cocoa powder
• ¼ cup (30 grams) all-purpose flour
• 2 ½ tbsp (25 grams) potato starch
• 5 large eggs, separated, at room temperature
• ¾ cup (150 grams) sugar
• 2 egg yolks, at room temperature
• 5 tbsp (2 ½ oz; 70 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled

Ingredients: The Cocoa Syrup

• ¾ cup (180 grams) water
• ½ cup (100 grams) sugar
• ¼ cup (25 grams) Dutch-processed cocoa powder

Ingredients: The Filling

(WARNING: This makes A LOT… maybe I just like my ganache in thinner layers?)

• 9 ½ oz (270 grams) bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
• 1 ½ cups loosely packed fresh raspberries (6 ¼ oz or 180 grams) OR 1 ½ cups frozen, thawed
• ¾ cup heavy cream
• 7 tbsp (3 ½ oz or 100 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature

Ingredients: Jam

• About 1/3 cup (around 115 grams) red raspberry jam, with seeds

How to: The Cake

1. Centre a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350ºF (180ºC). Butter a 9-inch (24-cm) springform pan, dust with flour, shake out excess.
2. Sift together the cocoa powder, potato starch and flour in a bowl and set aside.
3. Working in a mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the 5 egg whites until they hold soft peaks. Still beating, add ¼ cup (50 grams) sugar in a steady stream, and continue to beat until the whites are firm but still glossy.
4. In a large mixing bowl, beat the 7 egg yolks with the remaining ½ cup (100 grams) sugar together with a whisk until well blended and smooth. Switch to a rubber spatula and stir in one-third of the beaten whites to lighten the batter. Be careful not to deflate the egg whites too much! Next, gently fold in the melted butter, followed by the sifted dry ingredients. Finally, working with a light touch, fold in the remaining egg whites. [SC: I actually tend to add the butter last, before the remaining egg whites, but that's just me...]
5. Scrape the batter into the pan, slide the pan into the oven and bake for 35-40 minutes (***if your pan is larger than 9”, set the timer for 20 minutes and keep an eye on it to ensure it doesn’t burn***). The cake is done when it puffs, is springy to the touch, and is just starting to come away from the sides of the pan. [USE THESE VISUAL GUIDELINES AS CUES MORE THAN THE RECOMMENDED TIME.]
6. Transfer the cake to a cooling rack for 10 minutes, and then remove the sides of the pan; invert the cake onto another rack, turn it over onto the first rack, and then leave it to cool right side up. (The cake can be made ahead and wrapped airtight and kept at room temperature for a day or frozen for up to one month.)

How to: the Syrup

1. Put water, sugar and cocoa in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and let simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and cool. (The syrup can be made up to 1 week ahead and kept tightly covered in the fridge.)

How to: the Filling

1. Place the chocolate in a heat-proof bowl [best in metal]. Put fresh or frozen raspberries in the blender and with about 2 tbsp of water, purée [I usually don't add the water. If you can't blitz it, though, go for your life]. You should make around ¾ of a cup. Put purée in one small saucepan and bring to a boil. Put the cream into another saucepan and bring to the boil.
2. Pour boiled cream over chocolate and let stand 30 seconds. Then stir to a smooth consistency with a whisk. Gently add hot raspberry purée and mix well.
3. Add 7 tbsp of butter, one by one, and stir again. The ganache is now ready, and is best used within about 15 minutes. (You can press a piece of plastic wrap against the surface to create and airtight seal and refrigerate for up to 4 days. When you’re ready to use the ganache, just warm it gently over simmering water or on a low-power level in the microwave.)

How to: Assembling the cake

1. Wash, dry, and reassemble the springform pan. Bring the raspberry jam to a boil, remove from heat.
2. Using a serrated knife, carefully cut the cake into 3 even layers [If you only manage two, it's not a crisis... but three really is wonderful!]. Place the bottom layer cut side up in the pan and moisten it generously with cocoa syrup. You want the cake to be very moist, but not wet. Spread a thin coating of the hot raspberry jam over the cake evenly. Pour roughly one third (or less—I like less) of the ganache over the cake. Repeat this progression with remaining layers, be it just the one or two more. You will virtually certainly have remaining syrup and ganache, but likely the jam will all be used. It will look a bit messy, but all can be finessed in the serving.
3. Put the pan in the fridge for an hour until the ganache is firm. Then cover the pan with alu foil or plastic wrap and let chill for 12 hours, or best, overnight.

Dorie gives a little presentation secret, too: use a blowdryer around the edge of the pan to ease its removal afterward. Then, you can also run a butter knife around the edge to smooth it out and increase the gorgeous factor—but no one will care once they’ve had a bite.

Bake away!