Friday, June 17, 2011

Gluten-free Mango Torte with Chocolate-Coconut Ganache



So I debated long and hard whether or not I could use the term "ganache" to describe the thick chocolaty mixture that topped my unintentional torte. During this process, I discovered a lot of interesting things on Wikipedia.

1. Ganache comes from the French word for "jowl." Hilarious.
2. Ganache is typically made by heating heavy cream and then adding chocolate.
3. Proportions of cream to chocolate determine blah blah blah.

Ultimately, I decided to use it because

1. It sounds a lot prettier than "icing"
2. Even though I didn't use cream, I used milk.
3. Next time I'm definitely going to use cream. Thicker ganache? Yes, please.

And since we're already on the fascinating topic of ganache, I'll start there.



For my particular version I used:

Milk
Powdered sugar
Unsweetened cocoa powder
Shredded coconut
Little bit of salt

And I whisked, poured, tasted, repoured. The key here is balance; letting the powdered sugar and cocoa play even parts, and giving it just a splash of milk as you mix. I ended with a smooth, shiny chocolate-coconut delight that I wanted to eat out of the bowl. But I didn't; I saved it for the torte.

The torte! What a surprise it was.



A simple concoction:

Butter
Yogurt
1 Egg
Sugar
2 Mangoes
Gluten-free flour blend
Vanilla
Baking powder
Salt


I cut up 2 mangoes (that were on sale at Earth Fare for $.50 and it was almost as good as the time at Elsewhere some artists brought fresh mangoes they had stolen from their neighbor's tree in Florida), beat the butter, yogurt, egg, sugar and then added the cut mango. Threw in some vanilla, then the flour with baking powder and salt.

And the whole time, I thought I was making a cake.

I put it in the oven at 350 - my go-to temperature (though I eventually raised it to 375).

It didn't rise. After about an hour, I sighed, gave up on my cakey dreams, and took it out of the oven.

Well, it has mangoes in it so it has to be good.

I resigned myself to icing it inside the pan, knowing that any attempt to take it out would result in disaster. It felt incomplete, but some blueberries in the fridge did the trick.

After dinner, I brought out the "cake." We cut into it. M dad couldn't make up his mind about it, my mom and grandma praised it, and I was frustrated that it wasn't a cake.

Then it dawned on me; what is dense and sweet and kind of like a cake?

"It's a torte!" I declared.

Suddenly my dad changed his mind, and handed his plate in for seconds.

1 comment:

  1. I love the recipie title and the pictures are outstanding. I came home starving the other day and gobbled up the very last piece. Yum, Yum. AM going to pass your blog along to Pat, & AUnt Barbara and Mrs. Phillips. i think they'll like it. Oh, you got a typo on the first "my".
    Your fan, Mom

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