Dobos Torte, THE recipe?

[middydd]

Dobos Torte is pretty much my favourite cake ever. We used to have a local bakery that made a good one but they disappeared.

I've made many recipe for this cake, the cake itself is easy enough, the Joy of Cooking Genoise works. I'm still loooking for the perfect buttercream filling, though.

Anybody have a perfect Dobos Torte filling to recommend? Do you think it should be just chocolate flavoured or mocha ?

The recipe from Food and Wine is pretty good but the buttercream doesn't always thicken up enough.

[Katherine]

Dobos Torte is pretty much my favourite cake ever. We used to have a local bakery that made a good one but they disappeared.

I've made many recipe for this cake, the cake itself  is easy enough, the Joy of Cooking Genoise works. I'm still loooking for the perfect buttercream filling, though.

Anybody have a perfect Dobos Torte filling to recommend? Do you think it should be just chocolate flavoured or mocha ?

The recipe from Food and Wine is pretty good but the buttercream doesn't always thicken up enough.

Can you give us an ingredients list for the buttercream that didn't thicken up properly? I didn't find it on their website?

Alternatively, what are you looking for in a buttercream?

The filling recipe from the time/life series Foods of the World The Cooking of Vienna's Empire, Copyright 1968 & 1974) calls for the following:

1½ cups sugar

¼ teaspoon cream of tarter

2/3 cup water

8 egg yolks

1/2 cup dark unsweetened cocoa

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 cups unsalted butter, softened

To summarize, you boil the first three ingredients to 238ºF, whip the egg yolks until thick and light, slowly pour in the syrup and beat until thick and cool (I recommend a stand mixer here), about 15 minutes. Then beat in cocoa, vanilla, and finally the butter, which you have beaten to the consistency of mayonnaise.

As long as you wait for the egg yolks to cool completely to room temperature, this recipe will work great. Otherwise, it could be severely messed up if you let the butter melt by rushing it.

[Tracy K.]

My MIL probably has a fabulous Dobos Torte recipe...I've been trying for years to get her to translate her mother's recipes from Hungarian...hasn't done it yet. If she ever does....

[ludja]

As far as I know, all the dobos torte I've had have had chocolate fillings. (I have a few recipes also and they are all chocolate).

My Mom has always made a great one; in her recipe it is a simple chocolate buttercream enhanced with one egg yolk. It is adapted from Viennese Cooking by O. and A. Hess.

Beat 1 1/4 cups buttter until creamy.

Melt 4 1/2 oz semi-sweet chocolate (dark chocolate),

Let cool slightly, then beat in 1 cup sugar and 1 egg yolk.

Add chocolate mix to butter and beat until fluffy.

Cool in refridgerator before use.

Another recipe I have not yet made but which looks solid is in Rick Rodger's Kaffehaus.

(And if you order through this link, egullet gets some $$$).

This recipe is quite similar to that above, but with no egg. It has bittersweet chocolate, butter, dutch-process cocoa, confectioner's sugar and vanilla extract.

I remember when my Mom made this cake for the first time when I was pretty young. She didn't pre-cut the caramel cake layer before it hardened! It was quite an operation to cut pieces of cake.

This is one of my favorite cakes also. Good luck and post of pix of your creation here if you can!

Edited March 2, 2004 by ludja (log)

[middydd]

Here's link to the recipe:

http://www.foodandwine.com/invoke.cfm?obje...2BC0002B3309983

I suspect I didn't get the filling up to a high enough temperature for a long enough time. Would that keep it from thickening properly? I'm still a novice with real buttercream, after years of sticking to icing sugar mixtures.

[fredbram]

I have always used more of a wafery cookie recipe for the cake layers, rather than a sponge cake. Is this style familiar to any others?

[middydd]

I've always used a sponge cake recipe. I know the cookie type layers you mean, my mother uses that type of layer in her Vinartarta (prune filled Torte) and apparently the Icelandic cake developed from the Dobos Torte.

[ludja]

In Austria I've only seen thin spongecake layers used for the cake; likewise for recipes I have.

[ludja]

As far as I know, all the dobos torte I've had have had chocolate fillings. (I have a few recipes also and they are all chocolate).

Well...this discussion of Dobos torte made me want to browse through some of my cookbooks with Austro-Hungarian torte recipes and I found a recipe that also uses coffee in the filling (besides chocolate).

Lots of great torte recipes in this book besides the Dobos (Beatrix, Malakoff Cream, Chestnut, etc). It's a pretty authoritarian book and even has a few page discussion on the history of the Dobos torte; so it is likely this is at least 'one' of the authentic ways to make it!

George Lang's Cuisine of Hungary

(egullet gets a break if you order through this link)

Middydd: If you want the chocolate-coffee fillling just pm me.

Also, Rodger's Kaffehaus shows a pretty way to decorate this spectacular cake: Put a roasted hazelnut under each cut slice of the top caramel cake layer near the outside of the cake. You get a nice 3-D effect with the caramel slice rippliing across the cake. And decorate the cake sides with finely chopped roasted hazelnuts.

I am definately craving this cake now...

[middydd]

Ludja, I was googling recipes and came across the George Lang one. I went to my handwritten 25 year old notebook because his filling sounded so familiar. It's nearly identical to the very first recipe I ever made for this cake. I think I'll go back to it.

There's a recipe on FoodTv by Wolfgang Puck that sounds good, also on FoodTv.ca a variation with Hazelenut in the cake, and another in Maida Heatter's Book of Great Desserts. Hers sounds more like the New Orleans Doberge cake, no caramel on the top.

I looked at the KaffeeHaus book on amazon, it looks like a real treasure. I saw the picture of the Dobos Torte and wondered how they got the fan pieces to stick up at that angle. Thanks for the Hazelenut tip.

I'll report back how it goes, could you do the same if you make the cake?

The current issue of Cucina Italiana has a beautiful picture of a Dobos Torte, also with the fan effect on top. They add butter to the glaze so maybe it's a little softer than the crispy caramel.

[ludja]

I'll report back how it goes, could you do the same if you make the cake?

The current issue of Cucina Italiana has a beautiful picture of a Dobos Torte, also with the fan effect on top. They add butter to the glaze so maybe it's a little softer than the crispy caramel.

Good luck middydd; it would be fun to see a photo!

Thanks for the other sources; I also like to compare recipes.

I will put this on my list for the next time I have enough people to eat it. Maybe I need to make up a reason!

[niobe]

it is a wonderful cake my father in-law kept "hocking " me for one all the time- no one in the family had made it since his mother (from the old country) - trying to use her recipie was impossible, but fun to read- so i read up and put together a version i thought would do- i presented it to him for father's day- best gift i ever gave- the family fought over it- i made it once since- i thought maybe we could offer it at the bakery- i figured the ingredients cost about $5- the labor about $100! ( that was us getting our feet wet- so to speak) frankly, the simple mix of flavors and ingredients did nothing for me as a concept- however, when put together, the flavor is sublime. My layers were sponge, the filling a rich chocolate buttercream enhanced with egg yolk- it takes a lot of time - but worth the effort

[ludja]

frankly, the simple mix of flavors and ingredients did nothing for me as a concept- however, when put together, the flavor is sublime. My layers were sponge, the filling a rich chocolate buttercream enhanced with egg yolk- it takes a lot of time - but worth the effort

I agree that there is something very special about the way the flavors come together--The six thin layers of vanilla sponge cake with the silken buttercream in between some how taste very different than other 'chocolate' cakes. And then the crisp caramel layer adds such a nice bittersweet touch.

[middydd]

That's the secret of this cake, it adds up to something really special. I find some cakes that have more complicated components just become "too much" as a whole.

[middydd]

I really want to do the fan effect on the top of this cake. One recipe suggests piping buttercream along the edge of each slice to support the fan. Then there's the hazelnut tip.

A helpful hint I came across was to cut the top layer smaller than the other layers before coating with the caramel. Then the fan effect won't protrude outside the diameter of the cake.

[Rachel Perlow]

Another recipe I have not yet made but which looks solid is in Rick Rodger's Kaffehaus. 

(And if you order through this link, egullet gets some $$$). 

Actually, that link is not an eGulletified Amazon link, here are the correct links for the books you recommended upthread:

Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest, and Prague
George Lang's Cuisine of Hungary

Please support eGullet by making Amazon links that give eGullet a commission. Click here for instructions. Thanks.

[ludja]

Please support eGullet by making Amazon links that give eGullet a commission. Click here for instructions. Thanks.

Thanks for checking and correcting that Rachel. Confession; this was kind of a bait to see if I was doing it correctly...

I feel dense here, I tried the second recommended method; i.e. the one that does not require knowing the specif url and egullet numbers. When I was writing the reply, I just went down to the bottom of the page and clicked on the amazon ad to get to the proper Amazon page, copied the link, then went back and pasted this in to the reply. What am I doing wrong??? (I should also post this in the egullet question thread...)

[ludja]

zaelic and chromedome recently made a good point on this other thread:

favorite austrian and hungarian pastries

Dobos torta with less than seven layers would be like alcohol free beer.

Should point out that zaelic lives in Budapest.... home of the dobos torte.

Some of my newer cookbooks like Rodger's "Kaffehaus" and Lang's "Cuisine of Hungary" have only six total layers. My older cookbook, Hess's "Viennese Cooking" has 8-12 thinner layers. In all cases, I believe the idea is to make the filling and layers about the same thickness.

edited to add:

A helpful hint I came across was to cut the top layer smaller than the other layers before coating with the caramel. Then the fan effect won't protrude outside the diameter of the cake.

cool tip middydd

Edited March 5, 2004 by ludja (log)

[Rachel Perlow]

Yes, the link at the bottom of the page generates us a commission. However, once you are within a specific products page, that commission code is now in your cookies, not in the url at the top of the page. Someone else clicking the url that you used above would not have that cookie on their computer, therefore no commission to eGullet.

Better to not use a link within your post and just write out the book name and tell people to use the amazon link at the bottom of the page. However, we get a higher commission for items purchased through direct links, like the one I posted above. Thanks for your support!

[FoodMan]

I have been tempted to try this since I got my F&W issue with the recipe. I will defenitly try it now. Just curious, what is the FAN EFFECT??

Elie

[ludja]

I have been tempted to try this since I got my F&W issue with the recipe. I will defenitly try it now. Just curious, what is the FAN EFFECT??

Elie

The top layer of the cake is covered with a crisp caramel--that one quickly cuts into the apportioned pieces with a buttered knife before it hardens. So, one can then just lay these separated pieces on top of the cake (i.e. reconstructing the orginal shape).

The 'fan effect' is to just put a small something (eg. roasted hazelnut, knob of chocolate buttercream) underneath the end of each caramelized piece near the outside of the cake (i.e. at the outside of each caramel slice). You can arrange it so that the hazelnut support is not centered at the end of the wedge, but rather off-centered a bit so that that the slice tilts. If you go around and do this for each slice and tilt each piece the same way you get a 'fan effect' with each of the caramelized wedges. It is just a possible visual flourish.

Other potential 'garnishes' are to also pipe a ring of buttercream around the top edge of the cake and as mentioned above, can decorate sides of cakes with chopped, roasted hazelnuts. Can also pipe a small rosette of buttercream at the center junction of the caramel slices.

Hope this description is understandable

In any case, the cake will still be delicious and beautiful if you just let the cut pieces lay on top of the cake!

Edited March 5, 2004 by ludja (log)

[TrishCT]

The posts on this topic are truly inspiring... If y'all make this will you please let us know how it went...pics would be great! I would like to try this soon but not sure what recipe to use...

[FoodMan]

I have been tempted to try this since I got my F&W issue with the recipe. I will defenitly try it now. Just curious, what is the FAN EFFECT??

Elie

The top layer of the cake is covered with a crisp caramel--that one quickly cuts into the apportioned pieces with a buttered knife before it hardens. So, one can then just lay these separated pieces on top of the cake (i.e. reconstructing the orginal shape).

The 'fan effect' is to just put a small something (eg. roasted hazelnut, knob of chocolate buttercream) underneath the end of each caramelized piece near the outside of the cake (i.e. at the outside of each caramel slice). You can arrange it so that the hazelnut support is not centered at the end of the wedge, but rather off-centered a bit so that that the slice tilts. If you go around and do this for each slice and tilt each piece the same way you get a 'fan effect' with each of the caramelized wedges. It is just a possible visual flourish.

Other potential 'garnishes' are to also pipe a ring of buttercream around the top edge of the cake and as mentioned above, can decorate sides of cakes with chopped, roasted hazelnuts. Can also pipe a small rosette of buttercream at the center junction of the caramel slices.

Hope this description is understandable

In any case, the cake will still be delicious and beautiful if you just let the cut pieces lay on top of the cake!

Makes perfect sense. Thanks

Elie

[middydd]

Elie

The top layer of the cake is covered with a crisp caramel--that one quickly cuts into the apportioned pieces with a buttered knife before it hardens.

[Swisskaese]

The Dobos Torte recipe is in Culinaria Hungary. I think it is out of print, but you should try to get your hands on a used one.

Here is an Amazon link, but it is not the eGullet link.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/3829026188...531#reader-link

BTW - This is one of the best Hungarian cookbooks I have seen!

My future mother-in-law is Hungarian. A little like Zsa Zsa Gabor, without the seven or eight husbands!

Edited April 23, 2004 by Swisskaese (log)