The recipe produces a towering Black Forest-style gateau serving 8–10 with about 1 hour 5 minutes cooking and 1 hour preparation. Ingredients include eggs, brown sugar, cocoa, cherries (fresh, frozen or morello in syrup), kirsch or cherry brandy, double cream, vanilla, icing sugar, cherry jam, and optional shortcrust pastry. Sour cherries are traditional but fresh sweet cherries are adaptable after stewing with caster sugar; jarred morello cherries may be used instead. The stoned cherries are cooked gently until softened but intact. Shortcrust pastry is recommended for the base because it resists soaking better than sponge.
I think a long enough time has passed since the heyday of Sara Lee to concede the magnificence of the OG BFG: that towering torte of cherry brandy-soaked chocolate sponge, cherries and whipped cream whose name nods to the German Schwarzwalder's many cherry trees and the black, white and red of its traditional dress. It's also a very simple bake, because the show-stopping bit is all in the assembly.
A note on the cherries Traditionally, this cake is made with sour cherries, which aren't readily available in the UK. You can sometimes find them frozen, or use morello cherries in syrup/juice, instead, but there are still summer cherries in the shops, so I've devised this recipe to use the fresh sweet variety (skip step 2 if you're using jarred or tinned fruit).
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