Patrick Roger's Chocolate Cake for Easter

Parisian chocolatier, Patrick Roger’s Chocolate Cake – an easy recipe to recreate at home. Decorate with chocolate macarons for a special occasion.

Patrick Roger’s Chocolate Cake

Keeping the kids amused during the French school holidays is always fun. Fancy art museums in Paris? There’s also the Paris Choco Story – Chocolate Museum! Moreoever, what about checking out sculptures, made entirely out of chocolate?  This is how Patrick Roger’s Chocolate Cake happened.

There’s been much hype around chocolatier Patrick Roger’s new boutique at La Madeleine so it was time to enjoy the Patrick Roger experience in Paris with his out-of-the-box chocolate sculptures under one roof. As the tourists poured in and we looked around for the rest of the sculptures, we discovered the upstairs gallery was closed to the public. What? You mean…? We …. can’t see any more today? Dark chocolate lumps formed in our throats.

Chocolatier Patrick Roger’s chocolate sculptures at La Madeleine, Paris

Tails between our legs, we headed down Rue Royale.

As if by chocolate magic, Patrick Roger appeared that evening on France’s popular TV show, Top Chef. He was hosting a Chocolate Cake Challenge. The competing professional chefs’ faces were a picture when they saw Patrick’s alluring cheeky face appear but displaying his grand ‘MOF’ uniform: Meilleur Ouvrier de France, 2000. As he demonstrated his recipe, it called our next holiday activity; Amateur but macaron-style!

This was also a good excuse to use the most exquisite cooking chocolate from our local chocolate factory. Alas, they closed due to a fire but at the time of writing, the Chocolaterie du Pecq only opened their doors to the public in December, I’d gone bananas and stocked up with a whole cupboard of their products! The paradox? They supply their chocolate to Menard’s La Chocolatière in Tours, where Patrick Roger started out his career!

THIS is when I can eat out of a bucket!

Patrick Roger’s Chocolate Cake

Cake:
5 egg whites
210g caster sugar
1 egg yolk
100g flour, sifted
50g unsweetened cocoa powder
100g butter
80g hazelnuts, finely chopped

1. Using a mixer, whisk the egg whites, adding the caster sugar gradually until you have firm peaks. Add the egg yolk and continue to mix.

2. Fold in the flour with a large spatula and add the sifted cocoa powder. Gently melt the butter in a saucepan and mix into the batter with the hazelnuts.

3. Pour into a rectangular mould (I used a silicone rectangular cake mould) and bake 30 mins at 160°C. (I found with my oven that I needed to bake it for 40 minutes at this temperature).

4. When cool, cut the biscuit into 3 slices horizontally. (As you can see, I didn’t cut them as precisely as Patrick Roger did and regretted this afterwards!)

Syrup:
100g water
100g granulated sugar
100g rum
2  vanilla pods
the zest of an orange

5. In a saucepan, boil the above ingredients and scrape out the vanilla seeds from the pods.

6. Using a brush, cover each layer with syrup.

Chocolate fun for the school holidays

Ganache: (600g)
300g cream
40g honey
40g butter
300g dark chocolate (I used 64%)

7. Boil the cream with the honey, and pour onto the broken chocolate bits and whisk gently. Add the butter. Mix using a hand blender.

8. Cover the biscuit layers with the ganache, one on top of the other. Leave to rest for 30 mins then cover the cake with cocoa powder.

9. Using a stencil, dust with icing sugar to decorate.

Patrick Roger’s chocolate cake

Bear footprints? Well if you saw the weather in Paris last week, it snowed. Big time!

We were just left with un petit problème: we had too many chocolate macaron shells. A few of them managed to eat up the little extra ganache that was left but the rest have gone straight in to a pastry box in the freezer ‘bank’. That way the next chocolate dessert can be decorated with macarons with no effort at all!

Patrick Roger’s Chocolate Cake

Our family verdict? For chocolate dessert fans who don’t like their cake too sweet and appreciate the intense bitter chocolate flavours coming through, you’ll adore Patrick Roger’s Chocolate Cake.

Patrick Roger's Chocolate Cake

Author: Jill Colonna

Prep Time25 mins

Cook Time40 mins

Total Time1 hr 5 mins

Course : teatime, Dessert

Cuisine : French

Servings : 12 people

Print Recipe

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Description

For chocolate lovers who don’t like their cake too sweet and appreciate the intense bitter chocolate flavours coming through, you’ll adore this layered cake by Patrick Roger, Meilleur Ouvrier de France.

Ingredients

Cake:

• 5 egg whites
• 210 g caster sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 100 g flour sifted
• 50 g unsweetened cocoa powder
• 100 g butter
• 80 g hazelnuts finely chopped

Syrup:

• 100 g water
• 100 g granulated sugar
• 100 g rum
• 2 vanilla pods
• the zest of an orange

Ganache: (600g)

• 300 g cream
• 40 g honey
• 40 g butter
• 300 g dark chocolate I used 64%

Instructions

• Using a mixer, whisk the egg whites, adding the caster sugar gradually until you have firm peaks. Add the egg yolk and continue to mix.
• Fold in the flour with a large spatula and add the sifted cocoa powder. Gently melt the butter in a saucepan and mix into the batter with the hazelnuts.
• Pour into a rectangular mould (I used a silicone rectangular cake mould) and bake 30 mins at 160°C. (I found with my oven that I needed to bake it for 40 minutes at this temperature).
• When cool, cut the biscuit into 3 slices horizontally. (As you can see, I didn't cut them as precisely as Patrick Roger did and regretted this afterwards!)

For the syrup: In a saucepan, boil the above ingredients and scrape out the vanilla seeds from the pods.

• Using a brush, cover each layer with syrup.

For the Ganache: Boil the cream with the honey, and pour onto the broken chocolate bits and whisk gently. Add the butter. Mix using a hand blender.

• Cover the biscuit layers with the ganache, one on top of the other. Leave to rest for 30 mins then cover the cake with cocoa powder.
• Using a stencil, dust with icing sugar to decorate.

Hey – was it you who walked on our chocolate cake? Patrick Roger’s Grizzly chocolate sculpture