BEST THING I EVER ATE!

Brace yourselves people! This post is huge, dynamite in fact. Beware, this recipe is definitely laborious but the resulting goodness of this dessert is absolutely 110% percent worth every ounce of sweat that goes into it.

The soft, moist layers of chocolate crepe will make you forget any cake you ever ate. The creamy, fluffy whipped cream is the perfect accent to the intense coffee ganache and tangy raspberry jam. All in all, it's a marriage made in heaven!

I was fortunate enough to have a dear friend help me, so recruit your buddies to help you and make a party out of it! 

Chocolate Crepes

1/4 cup water
1 1/2 sticks cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces.

8 ounces semi-sweet chocolate

1 1/2 cups flour

1/3 cup confectioners sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 1/2 cups whole milk, room temperature (All I had was Heavy cream so I used 1 cup of that instead)

6 large eggs, room temperature

1 tablespoon pure vanilla

1. Start by heating 1/4 cup of water in a saucepan, once it comes to a summer start adding the butter in, one piece at a time. Whisk each piece until melted and then add the next piece.
2. Remove from heat and add the chocolate, whisk until smooth and set aside.
3. In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients together: Flour, Sugar and salt.
4. In a large bowl, add the eggs, milk (heavy cream) and vanilla and whisk to combine.
5. Now slowly incorporate the dry ingredients, in batches and whisk until combined.
6. Finally, add the chocolate and butter mixture and combine into a smooth paste.

At this time, if your batter is too thick, add more water to thin it out. (I ended up with a thick batter, but maybe that's because I used heavy cream instead of milk). You want a runny consistency to this batter, but not too thin either. The batter should be spreadable so the crepes come out nice and thin.

7. Now heat your skillet on low to medium heat and spray with some oil or butter. This will take a few trials so don't worry if the first few crepes don't come out perfect. You have plenty of batter to experiment with!
8. I started by using a 1/4 cup measuring spoon to spoon the batter in equal quantities. Pour batter on heated skillet and using the handle of the skillet, move it in circular motions to spread the batter in an even thin layer.
9. Once the batter looks dry-ish on the surface, turn the crepe over and cook for another minute.
10. Remove the crepe and transfer to a cooling rack. Repeat steps 8 -10 until you have 20 good thin crepes.

Once all crepes have completely cooled, cover them with some cling wrap and set aside. You can also refrigerate them at this point if you intend to assemble the cake the next day.













Coffee Ganache

1 cup heavy cream
12 ounces bitter sweet chocolate (chopped in small pieces)
1/2 cup of freshly brewed coffee (you can substitute with 2-3 tbsp of instant coffee powder)

1. Add the heavy cream and chocolate in a saucepan and heat on low-medium heat. Whisk continuously until the mixture is smooth.
2. Remove from heat and add the coffee and whisk to mix well.
3. Set aside to cool/you can also refrigerate this.

Whipped Cream - I mean come on! Do you really need a recipe for this!? I used about a cup of whipped cream with 2 tbsp of Confectioners sugar

1/2 cup of Raspberry Jam - whisked into a smooth paste

Assembly Line!

Set out the Crepes, Ganache, Whipped cream and Jam to form an assembly line

On a large cake dish or serving plate, start layering the ingredients: First a crepe, spread with ganache and layer another crepe. Then spread the whipped cream topped with another crepe and finally the raspberry jam. And repeat end with a crepe.

Transfer the cake to the refrigerator now, and let it cool and set for at least an hour.

Finally, you are ready to ice this baby! I had plenty of left over ganache and whipped cream so I mixed the two to make Coffee Whipped Cream and used that as the icing.

Transfer the iced cake back into the refrigerator. Ideally you should let it set overnight, but I was too eager and excited so I cut into this bad boy, so after refrigerating for an hour I whipped out the knife and had myself a nice big slice! It was delicious, moist, creamy and tangy!

Definitely THE BEST THING I EVER ATE!