My Mum’s Best Gateau " The Pitsa’s Best Bold Gateau "

My mum’s gateau

or

" The Pitsa’s Best Bold Gateau "

Ingredients:

Sponge cake:

½ cup of butter

½ cup cocoa powder

4 eggs

2 cups of flour that inflates itself

1 ½ cups of sugar

¾ cup of milk

¼ teaspoon soda powder cooking

Syrup:

1 glass of water

½ sugar

Cream filling:

1 cup of powdered sugar

1 cup of butter

4 eggs (separated from the egg yolks)

4 tablespoons of cognac or Amaretto or any liqueur or cognac of our choice

175 grams of cooking chocolate

Topping:

200 grams of cream and a little milk

1 cup of powdered sugar

Glace Cherries marinated in Cherry Brandy (optional)

Grated Chocolate (optional)

Method :

First we make our sponge cake! We start to beat the butter and sugar first until it becomes a fluffy, creamy mixture.

Then we add each one of the ingredients slowly, incorporating each one with the existing mixture. When this forms a well mixed cream we pour the mixture into our baking tray and bake at 175 C/ 155 C in a fan oven for 30 to 50 minutes. At 35 minutes, check with a skewer. if our sponge cake is cooked and the skewer comes out clean, it is ready. If not, back in the oven until it is ready.

Then we make the most delicious Pitsa’s cream! We start by meting the chocolate in a bain-marie.  Next we beat the icing sugar with the butter in the mixer until the mixture becomes fluffy and creates soft peaks.

Once the butter mixture has the desired texture , we add, one by one, the egg yolks. We start with the first one, makes sure it is fully incorporated into the mixture  and continue with the rest. Once we finish with the yolks, add the cognac and work the mixture until we are sure that it is all fully mixed and not split.

Then we add the melted chocolate, still in the mixer, so we have a wonderful chocolate cream (it will look pretty glossy !!!). Once ready , leave the chocolate cream on one side.

Next, we beat the four egg whites until they become a glossy and thick meringue! (I will not ask you to turn the bowl over your head  to test if it has thickened enough, because if it hasn’t ... you will have an accident !!) Be careful! Our meringue must be very stiff, creating stiff peaks when you remove the whisk.

After we have made our successful meringue, we add it gradually (in three batches) into the chocolate  mixture that has now cooled. Mix slowly and try to "fold" our meringue into the mix . ALWAYS we use a metal spoon. We start from below, and fold the mixture up ... as if we are creating ...  a surfing wave! Then cut & fold again unti all the mixture is fully incorporated into the mixture with no white streaks visible.

Once finished, put the cream in the refrigerator to firm up and set.

Back to our lovely sponge cake! Once baked we take it out of the oven and cool. Once it has cooled completely, we need to add syrupto  it, with hot syrup to be made right away. But we must first divide the sponge into three equal parts.

When you have cut your sponge into three equal parts , it is time to make the syrup.The process for this is is simple ... boil one glass of water with half a glass of sugar. Do not expect thick syrup fluid , on the contrary it will be thin. It is to add a bit of moisture and sweetness to the sponge only.

We always use a kitchen brush to spread the syrup on to the sponge uniformly. Not too much syrup, just make sure that our three surfaces will be covered  though do not completely soak the sponge otherwise the disks will dissolve and our lovely sweet will be a soggy mess. Still tasty, but not a gateau!

After adding the syrup, we divide the chocolate cream into two equal parts. Place our sponge base, onto a plate and add half the chocolate cream. Then place the second piece of sponge cake carefully onto the first. Put the rest of our cream onto the second sponge layer and finally put the third layer on to the top.If we have any of the cream left over, then we try to cover our cake with a thin layer (we never throw any materials or mixtures !!!) .

Let the gateau rest and set in the fridge for about 10 minutes  to unite all our ingredients and prepare the whipped cream to cover it! Beat 200 ml of double cream with the icing sugar and a splash of milk until it becomes a tight fluffy cream, that forms stiff peaks... just as we did with the meringue! 

As soon as our whipped cream is made, we take our cake out of the fridge, cover it with the whipped cream and decorate it as we want ... shards of chocolate, sprinkles, cherries, strawberries ... anything and everything that our soul loves ... my mother was very classical ... always she used to put cherry around the whole cake and grate chocolate in the middle ... I hated the cherries ... but I love them now!