- Tarun Kapoor is executive chef at Doha’s Horizon Manor Hotel. Send your feedback to:
exe.chef@horizonmanor.com

Chocolate truffle is a cake whose name is enough to bring a smile to anyone’s face. This is a classic cake that people love to savour any time of the day, anytime of the year and on any occasion.
Many readers have asked me about this cake and so I decided to write about how to make this at home, delighting your family and friends with your baking skills along the way.
The base for a good chocolate cake is mainly two ingredients: cocoa powder and the dark chocolate used in its preparation. The better the quality of ingredients used in the preparation the better the final product will be.
Every cake is comprised of three parts: first is the sponge which is the body of the cake, second is the icing which is the cover and taste of the cake, and the last but not the least is the garnish of the cake which will make it attractive and eye appealing.
Similarly the preparation of chocolate truffle cake is divided into three steps: first you need to bake a chocolate sponge and then prepare a chocolate truffle or ganache icing. Lastly you need to garnish the cake.
Depending on your choice and how comfortable you are with baking you can choose either a dark chocolate, or a milk or white chocolate to make your cake stand out from the regular chocolate truffle cakes you’ve always seen. But for those who are pretty new to baking, I would advise them to use dark chocolate as we all have seen them and know how they
actually appear and taste like so that experience will help you prepare a better chocolate truffle cake.
Talking about health, I must say that even though most people do not associate chocolate with healthy, recent studies have proven that dark chocolate is actually beneficial and healthy to consume in moderate quantities. Chocolate is said to be good for heart and regulating blood pressure when consumed in limited dosage.
Another important and essential question I often come across is the whitish colour on top of the chocolate. It is related to the aspect of chocolate manufacturing and every commercial chocolate is tempered before it is ready to be served. Yes you read it right — “tempered.” like we temper the food to make it more tasty and appealing. Tempering adds shine and strength to the chocolate. Sometimes when we see a greyish white colour on chocolate surface, that is because the chocolate has not been tempered and the cocoa butter has risen to the surface and is known as “bloom” in technical language. It is safe to consume that chocolate but it is less appealing to look.  

Chocolate Truffle Cake

Ingredients
For chocolate sponge
Whole egg 7 no
Castor sugar 250 gm
All-purpose flour 50 gm
Cocoa powder     50 gm
Baking powder ½ tsp
Vanilla essence few drops

For Chocolate Truffle
Dark chocolate 500 ml
Cooking cream 500 ml
For Garnish
Marzipan 100 gm
Biscuit crumble 30 gm
Chocolate shavings 30 gm
Other garnish As required

Method
Pre-heat the oven to 350 F.
Sift flour, cocoa powder and baking powder together and keep aside.
Whip sugar and eggs till light and fluffy; add vanilla essence.
Fold in the flour mixture into the creamed egg and sugar.
Pour the mixture into a greased square baking tray lined with baking paper.
Bake for 20- 25 minutes until a knife inserted in the sponge comes out clean.
Remove and allow it to cool down, remove baking paper and cut into two and slice into three layers and keep aside.
For the ganache coarsely chop chocolate into small pieces.
Bring cooking cream to boil in a heavy bottom pan and remove from flame.
Add coarsely chopped chocolate in the cream and stir to make a smooth ganache.
Allow it to stand at room temperature for about 2 hours.
Take the chocolate sponge and pour some ganache on one layer.
Place the second layer of sponge and pour some more ganache on top and place the third and the final sponge layer; refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Pour some more chocolate ganache on top and using a spatula to make it smooth.
Allow to stand in refrigerator for 30 minutes and garnish using marzipan shapes and biscuit crumble and chocolate shavings or as desired.