Thursday 24 March 2011

Flourless Chocolate and Lime cake with salted chocolate and lime ganache


The special ingredient for this month's we should cocoa challenge is lime and immediately I thought of a lime and chocolate cake from Nigella that a colleague had baked previously which was absolutely delicious. My second thought was lime and chocolate cookies which I've never tried but thought would be interesting. 
The main inspiration for this month's theme is from one of my favourite chocolate shops in London - Montezuma.  They have a flavour called Sea Dog which is dark chocolate with lime and sea salt. By the way they have the best butterscotch chocolate ever, even better than Green & Black's which was previously my favourite. 



Anyway back to the cake. The night I made my cake was the day my colleague found out he's passed his MRCP exams.  It's a professional exam for doctors which is incredibly difficult and requires knowledge, skills, hard work and dedication.  Definitely worthy of a celebratory cake. 
I used Nigella's recipe for the lime and chocolate cake.  I then made a chocolate ganache with the Sea Dog chocolate as I needed something to cover up the holes in my cake and also to be able to write a message. 
The end result is a rich, soft cake with the tangy taste of lime.  The cake also smells amazing!  You can barely taste the salt but that could be because I didn't quite have 150g of the Sea Dog chocolate and had to use some plain chocolate as well. I might try adding 1/4 teaspoon sea salt next time. 


 Beat eggs and sugars 

 add cocoa powder &ground almond mixture

 adding lime zest and juice 

 the top cracked as I removed it from the oven 

 that's what ganache is for :) 

 My fav glitter icing 

CONGRATULATIONS DR MURRAY!! 

For the cake
150g dark chocolate, chopped
150g unsalted butter
6 eggs
250g caster sugar
100g ground almonds
4 teaspoon cocoa powder
zest and juice of 1 lime

  • Preheat oven to 180C.
  • Melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a pan of simmering water and set aside. 
  • Beat the eggs and sugar using an electric mixer until about tripled in volume, pale and moussy. 
  • Mix the ground almonds with the cocoa powder and fold gently into the egg and sugar mixture, followed by slightly cooled chocolate mixture. 
  • Finally, fold in zest and juice of 1 lime.
  • Pour mixture into prepared cake tin and bake in the preheated oven for about 40-45 minutes. 


Dark chocolate, lime and sea salt ganache
150g "Sea Dog" chocolate
140ml sour cream
60 icing sugar
zest of 1 lime
juice of 1/2 lime 
  • Put all the ingredients into a bowl and melt over a pan of simmering water. 
  • Allow to melt but don't let it get too hot.
  • Remove from heat and stir vigorously until you have a smooth, glossy mixture.
  • Spread over cake with a palette knife and decorate as desired. 

12 comments:

  1. Sounds wonderful! I would have never thought to pair chocolate and lime together in a cake, but It sounds really good! Bet everyone loved it! :)

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  2. I imagine that this would be lovely and dense. Almond meal in a cake is gorgeous! Well done to your friend.

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  3. Loving the sound of the Sea Dog, must get my hands on some I think. Great cake and such a fantastic way to congratulate your friend too. Well done to you both ;0)

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  4. Well done with the cake and chocolate and lime is such a lovely flavour combo too! :D I wonder why they call the chocolate Sea Dog?

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  5. I haven't tried lime and chocolate either. Interesting!

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  6. What a lovely cake, sounds gorgeous. Coincidentally, a friend gave me a bar of the Sea Dog when she came to lunch and had a slice of my chocolate and lime cake - weird. If I'd had it a bit earlier I would have used it too. It sounds so good, it's still sitting in the cupboard because I can't bear to have it all gone - love the colour of the packaging too. Haven't tried Montezuma's butterscotch - G&B is my favourite. Well done for making the deadline.

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  7. Congratulations indeed, Dr Murray - and what says it better than an awesome choccy cake?

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  8. This sounds like my kind of cake. I love Montezuma's chocolate, especially the lime with chilli and the orange and geranium. I've just got to go back there again.

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  9. Loved the cake!!! It tasted absolutely delicious. Good choice on the chocolate. I love Montezuma. I'm in agreement with Phil, the chocolate with the chilli is pretty good. See you soon. xxx

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  10. Oh how I miss Montezuma! The drawbacks of not living in London anymore. The cake looks fantastic and I bet it tastes even better :)

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  11. Wow, that sounds really lovely! I love all the flavors in this! Yum!

    xx,
    Tammy

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  12. I made this too and it was scrumptious. I didn't frost mine. It looks great with the frosting.

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