Chocolate cake is one of the most popular flavors among cake lovers. You can even get a wide range of chocolate sweet – sweet, semisweet, and bittersweet are just some of them. If you like it to be milkier, you can easily find milk chocolate.
Another reason why the chocolate cake is everybody’s favorite is that the flavor of chocolate can be easily mixed with fruit flavor, something we commonly taste in a cake. Chocolate tastes great with the orange and lemon flavor. It also blends very well with grapefruit. This mixed flavor of sweetness and fruity for sure balance the tea or coffee you are enjoying with your piece of chocolate cake 🙂
We can find various recipes of chocolate cake that we can try to make at home. Among those recipes, there are two kinds that you might want to learn to bake. They are both not too simple to make, but the deliciousness you are going to enjoy is worth the effort. The cakes we are talking about is Sachertorte and Prague Cake. So, what makes these cakes special? and which one is hard to make? We are about to find out!
Sachertorte Vs. Prague Cake
- Sachertorte
- What Is Sachertorte?
Sachertorte is a specific chocolate cake invented by Franz Sacher, a famous confectioner, for Prince Wenzel von Metternich in Vienna. While the “Sacher” comes from the inventor’s name of this cake, “torte” is a word that means a multilayered cake with the filling of whipped cream, buttercreams, mousses, jams, or fruits in it.
In general, Sachertorte is a two-layered cake of soft and light chocolate cake. The two layers are separated with a layer of apricot jam. The whole cake is then covered with chocolate icing and served with unsweetened whipped cream. You will find some similar cakes recipes with the Sachertorte but it is still possible to find the original version. Hotel Sacher, a hotel established by Eduard Sacher, Franz Sacher’s eldest son, serves the initial version of his father’s world-famous chocolate cake. This is also the only place that has the right to the phrase “The Original Sachertorte”.
- How To Make It?
These are the ingredients you need to make Sachertorte:
For the cakes:
- 7 eggs (separate the whites and the egg yolks)
- 150 grams of softened butter
- 125 grams of icing sugar
- 125 grams of crystal sugar
- 200 grams of dark chocolate
- 1 pack of vanilla sugar
- A pinch of salt
- 150 grams of flour
- Butter and flour to cover the cake mold
- 200 grams of apricot jam
For the glaze:
- 200 grams of cooking chocolate
- 250 grams of sugar
- 150 milliliters of water
For garnish:
- Unsweetened whipped cream
These are how to make it:
- Melt the chocolate
- While waiting for the chocolate to melt, mix the butter, icing sugar, and vanilla sugar together until it reaches the creamy consistency. After that, gradually stir in the egg yolks.
- While preheating the oven to 180oC, you can prepare the cake mold by covering it with butter and flour.
- In another container, put in the egg white and a pinch of salt. Whip it up. After that, insert the crystal sugar and mix it until it is stiff.
- By this time, the chocolate must have been melted. Add the melted chocolate into the container with egg yolk in it and stir it together. Stir the mixture with the whipped egg whites alternately with the flour.
- When the dough has been mixed, fill it into the cake mold and bake for an hour.
- After an hour, let the cake out to cool off. Then, you may cut the cake at half crosswise. Spread the apricot jam on the base, put the other half on top of it, and spread the apricot jam again on the upper surface and around the edges.
- Make the glaze by heating the chocolate with the sugar. Wait until it is warm before pouring it over the cake. Spread the glaze to cover the whole cake using a palette knife and leave it to dry. Do not store it in the fridge. The low temperature will make the cake “sweat”.
- You can serve the Sachertorte with some unsweetened whipped cream.
- Prague Cake
- What Is Prague Cake?
Though the name of the cake mentions the city of Prague, this cake was invented by Vladimir Guralnik, a Soviet confectioner. In the 1070s, Guralnik worked in Praga (Prague) Hotel, a prestigious hotel located in the center of Moscow, as a pastry chef. This hotel was famous for many things – affluent menu, magnificent interior, and its status as Russia’s leading culinary “laboratory”. This was where the Prague Cake was created, hence the name.
Prague Cake is similar to Sachertorte. The thing that distinguishes it from the latter in its original sauce. While Sachertorte is covered with a glaze made of chocolate and sugar, Prague Cake is coated with a sauce made of chocolate and condensed milk.
- How To Make It?
The ingredients to make the layered cake of Prague Cake are the same with Sachertorte. The only difference is to make Sachetorte, you use chocolate, while for Prague Cake, you use cocoa powder. Just like the Sachertorte, once the cake is baked, let it cool down before cutting it into 3 layers.
As mentioned above, Prague Cake has its original sauce. This is the part that, between Sachertorte and Prague Cake, makes Prague Cake hard to make. You use this original sauce to cover two of its layer. These are the ingredients and how to make it:
- Boil the mixture of 1 egg yolk, 20 milliliters of water, 120 grams of condensed milk, and 2 teaspoons of vanilla sugar. Keep stirring it until it is boiled.
- Once boiled, turn off the heat, and continue the stir.
- Put 200 butter into a separated container, beat it while gradually add the syrup and 10 grams of cocoa butter.
- There you have the special sauce of Prague Cake! Spread it on the top of the first and the second layer of the cake. At the third layer, spread some of the apricot jam.
The topping of Prague Cake is slightly different from the Sachertorte. Its topping uses the mix of melted 100 grams of bitter chocolate and 100 grams of butter. Cover the cake with this topping and keep it in the fridge for 2 hours.
Now we know, if we put Sachertorte versus Prague Cake, Prague cake is hard to make because it has the special sauce to grease its layers.