Zacher cake classic

10 servings
2 hours

First of all, we will prepare a baking dish. We line the bottom of the mold with a diameter of 22 cm with baking paper, lubricate the sides of the mold with butter and sprinkle lightly with flour. We must shake off excess flour.

Now let's deal with the biscuit. To prepare it, take butter, bitter chocolate (at least 56% cocoa, or better 72%), sugar, eggs and flour.

We break chocolate into small pieces or chop it with a knife and transfer it into a bowl. Add diced butter to the chocolate. Put the bowl in the microwave or on a steam bath and melt the chocolate and butter.

Chocolate is a capricious thing, in no case should you overheat it, so be careful, especially if you drown in the microwave. Warm the chocolate for 10-20 seconds, taking out a bowl each time and stirring thoroughly. Put the resulting chocolate glaze aside and let it cool. Turn on the oven 180 degrees beforehand.

While the chocolate cools, we divide the eggs into proteins and yolks. It is very important that not a drop of yolk gets into the proteins, so be careful! Add half the sugar to the egg yolks.

And beat them with a mixer for 7-8 minutes until very lush and dense.

Add the already cooled chocolate glaze to the yolk mass.

And again beat the mass with a mixer for 1 minute until homogeneous.

Sift the flour and add it to the bowl. Thanks to sieving, the flour will be saturated with oxygen, and the finished biscuit will turn out to be bulkier and more airy

Gently mix (do not beat!) The dough with a spatula or whisk until completely homogeneous and smooth. The dough should be thick, but easily mixed.

Beat the squirrels to a light and lush foam.

Then, without stopping to beat in small portions, pour in the remaining half of the sugar. Once all the sugar has been added, beat the proteins to solid peaks and dissolve the sugar completely.

In small portions, we introduce proteins into the dough.

Gently mix the dough with folding movements. We act gently so that the proteins do not lose their volume.

We shift the finished dough into a previously prepared form. Do not lubricate the sides of the mold.

Bake the chocolate sponge in the oven preheated to 180 for about 45-50 minutes. Time can vary, it all depends on your oven. During baking, the oven door is not opened for the first 20-30 minutes, as the biscuit may fall. We check the readiness of the biscuit with a wooden skewer. Let the finished biscuit cool completely and, if there is time, let it stand for 5-6 hours.

We cut the cooled biscuit into 2 parts.

We apply half (or a little more) of apricot jam to one part of the biscuit in an even layer. If the jam is very thick, then first we heat it slightly in the microwave so that it becomes more liquid.

On top, lay out the other half of the biscuit flat side up.

We wipe the remaining jam through a fine sieve to make it uniform.

And we coat them with cake from all sides. In this form, we send the cake to the refrigerator for 20-30 minutes so that the apricot layer freezes.

Let's prepare the glaze.

We break the chocolate into pieces and mix it with butter.

Melt it in a microwave or steam bath.

Once the apricot layer has set, the cake can be glazed. To do this, we place the cake on a grill or build a structure like mine. We pour glaze on top of the cake and level it with a spatula.

Traditionally, the Zacher cake is decorated simply with an inscription. Therefore, we pour the remains of the glaze into a confectionery bag with a narrow (1-2 mm) nozzle or into a paper cornet and apply the inscription.

That's all! Sacher's chocolate cake is ready!

Traditionally it is served with whipped cream! I strongly advise you not to miss this moment, since the cream gives the cake a special tenderness. Enjoy your meal!