Torta Tenerina

Decadent fudgy cake topped with cream cheese whipped cream and passionfruit curd. 437: Torta Tenerina

The more elegant Italian name for a flourless chocolate cake, torta tenerina came about in 1900 as a treat to honor the new Italian queen Elena from Montenegro. It’s an extremely decadent brownie, but since it’s shaped like a cake, it’s socially acceptable to eat a bigger chunk of it in one sitting. Huzzah!

I went into this bake with only vague decoration ideas. A powdered sugar checkerboard pattern? Classic, but the surface isn’t perfectly smooth so it wouldn’t have the clean lines I was hoping for. Edible flowers? A “yes and” situation – the colors would pop but I want a textural element too. Whipped cream? Too light… mascarpone whipped cream? Getting warmer.

Final answer: cream cheese whipped cream squiggles and dots of passionfruit curd with blue corn flowers. I only chose cream cheese because I was out of mascarpone but hindsight is 20/20 and it was honestly the better choice. It added a tang that paired super well with the curd to cut the richness of the chocolate.

Both cocoa powder and block chocolate? Off to a good start.

Egg white bubbles are the only leavening agent, making this cake essentially aerated fudge. YUM.

While there’s no flour, there is potato starch to help offer some structure. It looks exactly like corn starch but apparently binds and thickens liquids faster.