Sprang this on an unsuspecting audience of my wife's coworkers at her holiday party and was a huge success.
Torte
1# Dark (65% cacao or so) quality chocolate
1# butter
1 cup stout (I used porter actually, but it was very close to a stout. It had a lot of chocolate malt, BU:GU of about .6 & ~5% ABV)
9 large eggs
Ganache
9 oz. Semi Sweet (50% cacao or so) quality chocolate
1 cup heavy cream
Coulis
12 oz. raspberries (can be frozen, just thaw ahead of time)
1/3 cup sugar
2 Tbls. water
-Chop dark chocolate into small pieces, add to butter in a medium saucepan & cook over low heat until melted. You want this to take a while, & never get too hot to not be able to touch the liquid with your finger.
-Add stout (I degassed mine by shaking it up in a syran wrapped cup, but maybe not necessary?) Remove from heat after thoroughly mixed.
-Whip eggs together until a good layer of froth forms on top.
-Fold eggs into chocolate mixture
-When mixed, add to a buttered 9" springform pan, bake in a bain-marie @ 350F for 50-60 minutes or until just set & a slight crisp forms to the top of the torte. When done, let cool at room temp for a few hours, then cover & refrigerate overnight.
-Remove the torte from the sides of the pan.
To make the ganache
-Chop semi-sweet chocolate into small pieces.
-Heat cream just to boiling.
-Pour cream over chocolate & stir quickly.
-When mixed, allow to cool for a couple minutes.
-Pour the ganache over the torte to cover completely, return to refrigerator, put in airtight container. Let cool for at least an hour or so.
To make the Coulis
-Boil water & sugar untila a syrup forms.
-Place raspberries in a blender, pour syrup over them & puree.
-You can run it through a sieve if you want to get rid of the seeds, but I don't.
-Refrigerate until ready to serve.
Tips:
-To more easily remove the torte, run a sharp blade along the edges of the pan first, then unclasp it.
-I keep the torte on the bottom of my springform pan & place on a baking rack abover the sink when I pour the ganache over it.
-You want to make sure that tehre is a slight grade to the cake, going down and out towards the edges, so that when you pour the ganache, it will not pool, rather run off it and coat evenly. You can trim the cake with a sharp serrated knif in spots to achieve this. I usually have to cut a little angle into the rim of the cake to achieve this.
-To clean up any crumbs/messy spots, run your finger through warm water & simply smear it across the cake to create a somewhat even texture. Doesn't need to be prefect, since it's getting a ganache.
-To serve, you can precut the slices with dental floss. Get a 12" length and just cut across the diameter of the cake for each cut.
-You could also use coffee in place of the stout if you're a pussy.
