Sacher Torte

[Gifted Gourmet]

from RestaurantSpy.com

In fact it was terribly dry - a hard, pale cake tasting faintly of chocolate, covered in chocolate fondant and I didn't finish it, despite having paid quite a lot. The coffee I had with it was OK, but by no means the best I had in Vienna. The place was less than 50% full, and while I quite enjoyed the air of ancient glory gone to seed, it was neither charming, comfortable nor friendly. ... The Hotel Sacher has a cast iron money spinner - Sachertorte is so famous that all they have to do is stay in business and keep on serving this dismal and expensive cake.

Dismal? Expensive?

Looks as if we have all had very similar experiences ...

but, wait, there is this lengthy defense of the real Sacher Torte

The cakes, after having been cut and spread with apricot preserves, are left to soak for two days, "so that the apricot taste and moisture go all the way through,". Then he does the glaze.  "This is the key," he says with a sly smile. "It is our secret, the chocolate. We use different chocolates with high degrees of cocoa; a combination of Austrian, French, and German chocolates — every one of them bitter." He will not divulge the names of the chocolates or the combination that is melted together to become the Sachertorte glaze. "We taste them all and we order by the year," is all he'll say, "fifty-five tons a year."  His touch with the glaze is neat, deft, careful. The melted chocolate is poured over the preserves-laden cake. "Notice it is poured," he says. "Next I smooth it with three strokes, three strokes only. Then along the sides. Then I leave it to cool."

[artisanbaker]

most people's opinons of this are in agreement: it's dry and not that good. some natives claim that it is just our "taste" in pastry, but i'm not convinced.

for a mouth watering recipe see the pro book alain ducasse desserts recipe. i made it to decent success in with tennessee clientele

[Swisskaese]

Demel is the only brand to buy.

I bring one to my MIL every year for her birthday. She adores Sacher Torte.

Edited December 7, 2005 by Swisskaese (log)

[Rehovot]

Huh. I had Sacher Torte at the Hotel Sacher this summer, and didn't find it dry at all, but dense and moist, so you can add my vote to the small but happy minority.

Viennese pastry is my downfall....Demel, Cafe Oberlaa, the pink Cafes Aida. Mmmm.

[sazji]

I would have to put in yet another "thumbs down" for sachertorte. Someone told me it was made with incredibly high amounts of sugar and dry so that it could be sent without spoiling. I found it dry, flavorless and way too sweet. Actually I had lots of pastry that just didn't do it for me, both in Vienna and in Innsbruck. Oh well..

[etalanian]

We tried the Sacher torte at the Hotel Sacher and were shocked at how dry and flavorless it was. We love to eat desserts "mit schlag" but it would have required a bowlful to make that cake palatable. That being said, there seemed to be many locals there who were eating it with pleasure. We went to Demel, but after having one bad experience with Sacher Torte, we never ordered it again. Sorry now that we didn't. Maybe I would have a better opinion of it if I had.

So one more negative vote for the Sacher.

Eileen

[Corinna Dunne]

... Oh, I loved the Sacher torte, the great tea and the sheer refinement of the whole experience.

[albiston]

Huh. I had Sacher Torte at the Hotel Sacher this summer, and didn't find it dry at all, but dense and moist, so you can add my vote to the small but happy minority. 

←

I'll add myself to the list of Hotel Sacher's Torte appreciators, though I must admit my last and only Sacher goes back some eleven years.

The Torte I had back then was definitely moist and rich in chocolate and absolutely not too sweet (something I cannot stand in cakes). On the same trip I also tried Demel's Sacher, but found it slightly sweeter and therefore less to my taste. Makes me wonder if Hotel Sacher has changed the recipe somehow,

[Adam Balic]

Would they alter the recipe for local v mail order consumption?

Another thought is do they alter the recipe for regional taste peferences (like say Champagne), but have got it wrong?

Damn, I was in Vienna on the weekend and didn't taste it.

Edited December 8, 2005 by Adam Balic (log)

[nicolekaplan]

back in my youth when i travelled for work i used to get demel in tokyo all the time and it was good, so maybe i will give it one more shot and order something from them. maybe it will be a good excuse to give my husband something to get me for christmas. but i'm glad to know i'm not the only one to be so dissapointed

[Tapenade]

We tried the Sacher torte at the Hotel Sacher and were shocked at how dry and flavorless it was. We love to eat desserts "mit schlag" but it would have required a bowlful to make that cake palatable. That being said, there seemed to be many locals there who were eating it with pleasure. We went to Demel, but after having one bad experience with Sacher Torte, we never ordered it again. Sorry now that we didn't. Maybe I would have a better opinion of it if I had.

So one more negative vote for the Sacher.

Eileen

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I grew up eating Hungarian and Viennese cakes, and my experience was that the chocolate sponge tended to be pretty dense and solid, not wet and fluffy, but that it was tastier as a result. This was especially true for cakes that had lots of cream or fruit, and in my opinion this contrast only added to the pleasure. I've also heard that the Sachertorte at Hotel Sacher isn't the best, but that certainly doesn't mean that everyone else's is bad. And I've had home-made (by a Hungarian) Sachertorte that was absolutely outstanding .

[ludja]

...

Anyway, one of the Cafes slices the cake and adds a layer of apricot jam, the other just covers the cake. I cannot remember from the top of my head, but I believe Demel is the one that doesn't slice, thus claiming to have the older version of Sacher's recipe. There are quite a few legends about how the original recipe ended up with Demel, but a court-ruling had decided that only Sacher may name its torte original.

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I believe the Sacher Hotel version splits the cake, filling it with a thin layer of apricot glaze while the Demel Konditorei does not. I'm not sure if Demel uses an apricot glaze on the outside of the cake though.

I thought of this thread when I ran across an article the other day mentioning that it was the 175th birthday of the Sacher Torte and that the original recipe was still secret... click

The story started in 1832 when the Austrian chancellor at the time, Count Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, asked for a new desert that would impress his guests. His requirement: "don´t make me look a fool tonight!"

When the master chef took ill, a 16-year-old apprentice, Franz Sacher, was entrusted with the task. "He came up with a recipe that would make his job easier," said Gurtler.

The demands of Metternich's daily banquets meant that large quantities of desserts had to be prepared in advance - in the days when there were no refrigerators and no preservatives.

"Even then, we could make Sacher-Torte that would keep for at least a fortnight," said Gurtler.

The dessert consists of two layers of dense chocolate cake with a fine spreading of apricot jam in between. Rich, dark chocolate icing coats the top and sides.

From the few details offered by pastry chef Alfred Buxbaum, it seems the icing makes all the difference. "I use three types of chocolate and we work with about 2,000 litres (quarts) of liquid chocolate on hand at all times," he said, adding he'll be slapped with a "six-figure fine if I say more."

Regarding the secrecy, the article mentions that a descendent of Sacher released what she says is the original recipe to an Austrian newspaper. Here's a link to the recipe (in German):

click

I think other "original" recipes have popped up from time to time; I'm not sure if this latest original recipe has more or less credibility. In any case, to me it's more just a fun thing to hear about the secret recipe and the stories and traditions surrounding it.

Another thing to mention, the Hotel Sacher says it bakes over 320,000 Sacher Tortes per year. Yikes, that's almost a 1000 cakes/day!

Edited to add: Just remembered that I have baked a Sacher Torte once with my Mom awhile back; have no idea which recipe it was though. We baked it for an older Viennese gentleman who had lived in the US for many years. Tasting the cake brought tears to his eyes (in a good way). I have several recipes now but would probably first try one of the two recipes that Rick Rodgers gives in his cookbook on Austro-Hungarian and Czech desserts in Kaffehaus .

Edited April 27, 2007 by ludja (log)

[Daniel Rogov]

As to the Saher/Demel argument, I once wrote:

"Sacher, a fun-loving man who consumed enormous amounts of his own cakes, weighed well over 120 kilograms. One of the most popular sweets in the world is the cake that carries the name of this great baker, but even today the Viennese love to argue about whether Sacher or one of his competitors, Henrich Demel invented the "Sachertorte". The two became bitter enemies until a court ruled that Sacher had the right to call his cake the "original Sachertorte" and that Demer had to be satisfied by calling his version "genuine Sachertorte".

[Woods]

Sacher Torte from Berl's The Classic Art of Viennese Pastry

[ludja]

Details, please!

Have you made this recipe before? Will you cut the cake into two layers and fill w/apricot glaze/jam?

Let us know how it turns out.

Edited October 26, 2007 by ludja (log)