Dark chocolate, chestnut and almond torte

I found this recipe on The Salad Club blog when I was looking for a way to use up chestnuts and produce a pudding at the same time. I made some tiny changes and it turned out really lovely and is still good a week later... It is rich and chocolatey, yet light and lemony, with velvety chestnut chunks.

Pre heat the oven to 150 celcius and butter your cake tin. Ideally you would roast your own chestnuts and shell them... but those vacuum packed ones are really good and easy.



Put a packet of chestnuts in a pan of milk and simmer for 10-15 minutes. The milk that is left after this process smells and tastes amazing, but the recipe doesn't use it, so I definitely need to think of something good to do with it...

While the chestnuts are simmering chop up a large bar of 70% dark chocolate, I used Green and Blacks, and a 100g packet of blanched almonds. They are actually better if chunky, so you don't need to put too much effort in...

Cream 125g of unsalted butter and 200g of caster sugar together in a large bowl until fluffy. Then seperate five eggs and beat the yolks into the butter and sugar one at a time. Keep the whites as they need to go in later.



Next chop up the drained soft milky chestnuts, keep them chunky, like the chocolate and almonds. Add them all to the mixture. Grate in the zest of a whole lemon too.

Whisk the egg whites until they stand up in gentle peaks, I did it by hand and it wasn't as awful as I thought, but obviously an electric whisk makes it easier. When done fold about a quarter of them into the mix, to get it going, then mix in the rest. Be gentle to keep the air in...

Pour the mix into your cake tin and put it in the oven for 40-45 minutes. Take it out when it's done and allow it to totally cool. Break up another bar of dark chocolate and melt it in a pan with a tablespoon of butter. When it's all melted spread it over the torte and it will dry into a rich chocolatey shell. It is maybe more cake than torte, although I did serve it as a pudding after dinner. I don't think you should have cake as pudding generally, but I think this was borderline and no one complained that much...