Boca Negra

This week’s Tuesdays with Dorie recipe is Boca Negra, which is a deep, dark, nearly flourless chocolate cake. This week’s host is Cathy of A Frederick Food Garden. You can get the complete recipe for this cake on her blog. Make sure you also stop by the Tuesdays with Dorie site to see the links left by all of this week’s bakers.

One of the things that I love about the Tuesdays with Dorie group is that I can check in with the other bakers and see what issues and successes they had with the week’s recipe. This week’s recipe wasn’t an easy one, which is a bit strange because the ingredients are so simple. You boil sugar and bourbon, then pour it over chopped chocolate to melt it. You then add butter and eggs. Now, the only heat to melt the chocolate and the butter is the boiling sugar/bourbon mixture, and it cools quickly. I tried mixing this by hand but had to resort to using the food processor as the mixture was too stiff and I didn’t ever think I would get all of the butter added. I guess I wasn’t alone in this; it was hard for a number of other bakers. It looked great going in the oven so it was worth the extra trouble.

I baked mine for 30 minutes, but it wasn’t close to done so I baked it about 10 minutes more, which was just right. Taking it out of the pan right away was a bit tricky, but I managed it. I had a few cracks in the top of the cake but they went away as the cake cooled. This cake looks deceptively plain; but it’s one of the best cakes I have ever had. It’s thin and super chocolaty. It’s kind of like eating mousse. The white chocolate cream solidified for me, but I scooped it up kind of like ice cream and it was lovely with the cake. This cake took a little more effort, but it was worth it!

Recipe from Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan, page 253