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• Melted chocolate in the batter, whipped whites for lift. No baking powder. The cake is deliberately firm and slightly dry, which is why the jam and the cream are structural rather than optional.
• The apricot layer must be hot and sieved. Warm the jam, push it through a sieve, and brush it thinly over the whole cake. It seals the crumb so the glaze does not soak in and gives a smooth surface for it to sit on.
• The glaze is a cooked sugar glaze, not a ganache. Sugar and water boiled to about 108 °C, then chocolate stirred in off the heat. It sets to a matte, snappable shell. A cream ganache stays soft and is not a Sachertorte glaze.
• Pour the glaze in one movement over a cake on a rack, and do not touch it with a spatula afterwards. Working it dulls the shine.
• Unsweetened cream is mandatory in Vienna and it is correct — the cake is sweet and dry, the cream is neither.

One 22 cm cake. Serves 12.

Cake:

• 130 g dark chocolate, 55–60% — see Chocolates
• 130 g unsalted butter, softened
• 100 g powdered sugar
• 6 eggs, separated
• 100 g caster sugar
• 130 g all-purpose flour
• 3 g fine salt
• 1 tsp vanilla — see Pure vanilla extract

Filling and glaze:

• 200 g apricot jam
• 2 tbsp rum or water
• 200 g granulated sugar
• 125 ml water
• 150 g dark chocolate, chopped

Heat the oven to 170 °C / 340 °F. Butter and line a 22 cm tin.

Melt the 130 g chocolate and cool slightly. Cream the butter and powdered sugar four minutes, beat in the yolks one at a time, then the melted chocolate and vanilla.

Whip the whites to soft peaks, add the caster sugar gradually, and whip to firm peaks. Fold a third into the batter, then alternate the remaining meringue with the sifted flour and salt in two additions.

Bake 45–50 minutes. Cool ten minutes, turn out, cool completely, then split horizontally.

Warm the jam with the rum and sieve it. Brush the cut face of the bottom layer, reassemble, and brush the entire outside thinly. Leave 30 minutes to set.

Boil the sugar and water to 108 °C. Off the heat, stir in the chopped chocolate until smooth. Cool to about 40 °C — it should coat a spoon thickly — and pour over the cake in one go, letting it flow down the sides. Leave to set at room temperature, several hours.

• Do not refrigerate the glazed cake. Condensation dulls it and the glaze goes grey.
• The Demel version puts the jam only under the glaze, not through the middle. Both are correct depending on which court you believe.
• Keeps a week at room temperature under a dome — it is a dry cake by design and it is at its best on day two or three.

Method and theory: Cake recipes · cakes · Chocolates · Apricot

Nearby: dobos torte · opera cake · black forest cake