alexandra’s kitchen: Passover Chocolate Cake

Monday, April 2, 2007

Passover Chocolate Cake

Of all the symbolic foods on the Passover Seder table, matzoh is the most important. Made without yeast and quickly baked, matzoh reminds Seder participants of the Jews fleeing Egypt who had no time to leaven their bread or bake it properly. Flour used to make matzoh is made from wheat that is “watched” from the moment of harvesting to ensure it never contacts any water, which might cause the flour to expand and rise.
As leavened flour is prohibited during Passover, flourless chocolate cakes are popular Passover desserts. This rich chocolate cake rises dramatically, cracks and then falls. When dusted with Passover “confectioners’ sugar” and garnished with berries, the cake looks striking on the table.

Flourless Chocolate - Almond Cake
Yield = 1 9-inch cake

8 oz semisweet chocolate
8 tablespoons margarine or butter
½ teaspoon kosher salt
¼ teaspoon almond extract
4 large eggs, separated
2 large eggs, whole
1/3 cup plus ½ cup sugar
½ cup almond flour

1/3 cup granulated sugar
½ teaspoon potato starch
or confectioners' sugar (for non-observers)

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Place chocolate and margarine or butter in bowl and microwave on high for one minute, stirring once after 30 seconds.
Coat a 9-inch springform pan with nonstick spray. Line bottom with round of parchment paper, then spray the parchment as well.
Whisk chocolate mixture until smooth, then add salt and almond extract and stir until blended.
Whisk the four yolks and two whole eggs with the 1/3 cup of sugar just until blended. Add yolk mixture to chocolate mixture and whisk until smooth. Stir in almond flour.
In the bowl of an electric mixture, whip the four egg whites until soft peaks form. Gradually add the ½ cup sugar and beat until egg whites become shiny and hold their peaks, but are not too stiff.
Stir one third of the beaten egg whites into the batter to lighten. Then, in two additions, gently fold in the remaining egg whites. Pour batter into pan and place in oven. Bake for 35 - 40 minutes.
Cake will rise and have cracks running across it. It should feel only slightly wobbly when gently pressed. Remove from oven and let cool in pan 10 minutes before removing sides and transferring to cooling rack. Meanwhile, pulse sugar and potato starch in a spice grinder to make a powder. Sift mixture over cake and serve.

The Eggmobile

The eggmobile houses laying hens. It follows the herd of cattle, arriving to grass they've grazed on four days earlier.The hens peck at the four-day-old cow pies, eating various insects, larvae and parasites - rich sources of protein - and accomplishing a whole lot more along the way: By eating the fly larvae and parasites, they rid the land of potential pathogens and disease; by scratching through the droppings and spreading them across the grass, they enable the manure to sink into the ground and fertilize the soil; and by eating the pesky insects, they reduce the presence of one of the cows' biggest irritants.

The Barn

Joel Salatin stands in the open-sided shelter where his cows spends a portion of the winter. During the winter, the cows eat hay (dried grass accumulated throughout the growing season), and live on a bedding consisting of woodchips, sawdust and old hay to absorb the cows' excrement. When the heavy cows tread on their nitrogen-rich manure and on the carbon-rich bedding, packing it together, they allow the mixture to ferment (anaerobic composting). By adding corn to the bedding, Salatin entices his pigs to turn the bedding into compost: When the cows return to pasture in March, the pigs dig through the densely packed bedding, searching for the tasty fermented corn, aerating the pile and turning it into compost for the spring.

Corn Pudding