The setting: A Sri Lankan Presidential bungalow turned into an intimate, sexy restaurant. Think dark panelling, ornate pillars, flowers everywhere.
The food: Fabulous nouvelle cuisine. The right mixture of local and international flavours, all carefully prepared and beautifully presented.
Isn’t it odd then, that the only thing I can remember about that meal is the dessert? This beauty was called Boca Negra and was easily the best chocolate cake I or indeed any of us had ever tasted.
We were having dinner at Tintagel in Colombo. The home of three previous Sri Lankan presidents that has now been turned into a gorgeous heritage hotel by the Paradise Group, which most visitors to Colombo will know as the owners of the very stylish Paradise Road stores. In keeping with the Paradise Road theme, everything here is black-and-white, from the linen to the tableware to the waiters’ uniforms, with the only splashes of colour coming from the flowers placed everywhere.
But back to the dessert. This was our last night in Colombo and our Sri Lankan friends suggested a dinner at Tintagel. The meal as mentioned earlier was fabulous but uneventful until the dessert. We were told that we had to try it and we obligingly ordered it and here it was. This unprepossessing looking chocolate cake, slightly flat looking, served alongside a dollop of vanilla ice-cream. To be honest, it did not look too appealing, but being polite people and not wanting to disappoint our hosts, we dug into it.
And dug into it, and then dug some more, and could not stop. The table went quiet and our eyes grew wider, as our local friends watched us in amusement. This was the lightest chocolate cake happily married to the deepest, darkest chocolate mousse. This was chocolate cake that made other chocolate cakes pretenders to the title. This was the cake you wanted to hide and eat all by yourself, guarding it jealously. This was pure chocolate ecstasy. We frantically signalled to the waiter to get us another slice, if not the whole cake, but tragically we had had the last one and the kitchen was closed.
And now I have to confess, I am not even a chocolate fan. I seldom buy chocolate to eat. The only chocolate I do buy is for cooking and that has about 70 per cent cocoa, if not more and is as bitter as it sounds. I do try the occasional chocolate dessert, but prefer a fruit-based dessert most of the time. But this was a revelation to me. This was how chocolate is meant to be cooked.
Back in Bangalore, after many wistful hours longing for the Boca Negra, I did some research on the Internet. Turns out this is a famous Julia Child recipe and is a flourless chocolate cake. Boca Negra translates to ‘black mouth’ in Spanish, so named because your mouth turns black after one bite. Needless to say, I make this dessert very often now. It is not a challenging recipe and is actually very easy to prepare. Everytime I make it and feed it to people who have not eaten it before, I love watching their expressions change after one bite. The only tip I can give is to use the best, darkest chocolate you can afford. And to not count the calories when you eat it. This is in no way, my original recipe but I guess, a take on the many takes on the classic.
Boca Negra
12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup bourbon (or rum)
1 1/3 cups granulated sugar
8 ounces (2 sticks) butter, cut in 10 pieces
5 eggs
Preheat the oven to 350F and butter a nine-inch round cake dish. Line the bottom with a wax paper circle and butter again. Set the cake pan in a roasting pan and keep aside. Get a kettle of water boiling as you make the batter.
Place the chocolate in a food processor bowl fitted with a metal blade.
In a medium sized pan, combine bourbon and sugar. Cook over high heat, stirring, until sugar is dissolved. Bring it to a full boil and pour over chocolate. Whizz chocolate and syrup until smooth, about 20 seconds.
With the motor running, drop in the butter piece by piece, making sure each is fully incorporated before adding the next. Add in the eggs one at a time.
Pour the batter into prepared pan. Place roasting pan in the oven and fill it with boiling water from the kettle until it reaches 1/2 way up the side of the cake pan. Bake for exactly 30 minutes.
Carefully remove the cake pan from the water bath. Dry the cake pan. Lay a piece of plastic wrap over the top of the pan. Invert cake (and plastic wrap) onto a flat plate and remove the parchment paper circle. Reinvert cake onto a serving platter and remove plastic wrap.
Serve warm, or at room temperature, with whipped cream.
mouthwatering post!