See part 1
Whisk the eggs and sugar together in a large heatproof bowl or the bowl of
a heavy-duty mixer. Set the bowl over direct heat or in a pan of barely
simmering water and heat the eggs, whisking constantly, until they are warm
to the touch. Remove the bowl from the heat and, working with a heavy-duty
mixer fitted with the whisk attachment (or using a hand-held mixer), beat
the eggs at high speed until they are cool, have tripled in volume, and
hold a ribbon when the whisk is lifted.
Sift one third of the dry ingredients over the eggs and, using a large
rubber spatula, fold in gently but thoroughly. When the color of the
batter is almost uniform, fold in the rest of the flour-cocoa mixture.=
Spoon about 1 cup of the batter into the hot clarified butter add fold
together until well blended. Spoon this over the batter and, using the
large rubber spatula, gently fold it in.
Spoon the batter into the pan: there’s no need to smooth the top or rap the
pan on the counter, as is sometimes done with foam-based cakes. Bake the
cake for 25-30 minutes, or until top of the cake springs back when pressed
gently. Transfer the pan to a rack and let the cake cool in the pan.
When the cake is completely cool, run a small knife around the sides of the
pan to release the cake and unmold onto a rack; invert right side up onto a
piece of parchment paper. (The cake can be made ahead to this point,
wrapped well, and kept in the refrigerator for up to 2 days or frozen for
up to 3 months. Thaw, still wrapped, at room temperature.)
Preparing the Chocolate — The chocolate is going to be spread and then
scraped into ruffles from four baking pans; if you don’t have enough pans,
you can make the ruffles in 2 batches. Choose heavy-duty jelly-roll pans
that are neither warped nor dented, neither nonstick non treated with
special coatings. Keep them close at hand.
Melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl set in a skillet of barely simmering
water, in the top of a double boiler over an inch of simmering water, or in
a microwave oven sat at medium power. Stir the chocolate regularly until it
is fully melted. Smooth, and 115F to 120F (You can test the temperature
with an instant-read thermometer or by putting a drop on your top lip – it
should feel warm.)
Hold the bottom of one of the baking sheets over a burner (either gas or
electric) and, moving it back and forth, heat it until it is warm but not
hot enough to burn your fingers. Put the baking pan upside down on a flat
surface and pour on about 1/3 cup of the chocolate. Use an offset spatula
to spread the chocolate thinly and evenly over the bottom of the baking
pan: the chocolate will only be about 1/16 inch thick. Refrigerate the pan
for at least 30 minutes, or for as long as several hours, depending on your
schedule. (It is better to chill the pans for a long time and let them come
up to ruffling temperature – in which case they’ll stay at temperature
longer – than to catch them the moment they turn cool enough to ruffle.)
Repeat with rest of the chocolate and the other baking pans.
Shaping the Ruffles — To shape the ruffles, work with one baking pan of
chocolate at a time. Remove a pan of chocolate from the refrigerator and
leave it at room temperature to warm gradually until it is pliable enough
to be scraped.
Place the baking pan on a counter in front of you, a short side braced
against your body. Hold the end of the blade of a then, flexible 8-inch
metal icing spatula in your left hand (reverse procedures if left-handed)
and, with your right hand, grab the blade close to the handle. You should
have 4 to 5 inches of blade exposed and available for ruffling.
Using the top left corner of the pan as your staring point and imagining
that corner of the pan as 12 o’clock, position your left hand in that
corner, and your right at 2 o’clock. Press the edge of the blade against
the chocolate at a very shallow angle, as if you were going to slide the
spatula blade under the chocolate. Now slide the blade forward, moving your
right hand down to 5 o’clock and then pivoting the blade to the left, all
the way to the edge of the pan. As your right hand is moving down, so is
your left, although not as far – your left hand will move down 4 to 5
inches. This is an important point – if you don’t move your left hand
down, you’ll end up with tight curls of chocolate rather than ruffles. As
you scrape and ruffle the chocolate against the blade and then make the
pivot, the chocolate will gather against the blade — use you left hand to
pinch the chocolate so that the ruffles form a fan and the pinched part is
a little handle. You’ve completed one ruffle.
CONT in part 3
Yields
1 Servings