Chocolate Almond Torte... almost

Today woke up with rain! Yay! Rain! The weather becomes so much more noticeable in a country town, and with such a vast amount of lawn (for now its lawn), that after a week of mega sunshine we were stoked. We scuttled up into the roof first thing to put in some insulation. When it’s 33degrees outside and inside is 32 (see I told you weather = much more interesting all of a sudden) we needed some action and fast. Half the house is now done and the bedrooms are already noticeably cooler.

Anyway, as it was cooler today I thought I would give my new kitchen and oven a test run. Speaking to our neighbour over the fence (yes that really does happen!) we discovered that it was her birthday on Friday.  Never one to pass up an opportunity to be neighbourly and fulfil a beautiful cliché, I thought I would bake our neighbour a cake.

We bought the ingredients when we went to get more insulation (measure twice purchase once dammit!) and this afternoon I set to it.

The cake is a thoroughly enjoyable one to make. Gooey silky brown chocolate mix all in the one saucepan. Enjoyable, that is, until the moment I realised I was no longer in possession of an electric whisk. The one in Sydney belonged to our house mate. Twice in only one week now I have become unstuck in the kitchen because of not owning such a device (hint hint husband). Not only do we not own an electric whisk, we do not even own a mechanical one. So hand held it was. The process of the cake baking became momentarily less enjoyable as I proceeded to whisk the egg whites (Tip: Just push through the pain, don’t stop whisking it will only make it hurt more!) but as they did eventually stand up that old sense of achievement came back of why I used to bake all the time for fun as a kid.

Into the pan it went, but alas my oven is wayyyyy hot… like 30 degrees hotter inside than it says it is on the dial. Ouch. Also this is a runny mixture and proceeded to drip all through my clean shiny oven. Due to the oven temperature the cake burnt and was not fit for sharing with my (very forgiving) husband let alone my new neighbour. And as it currently tastes like charcoal I don't even want to give you the recipe yet as I don't know what it really tastes like. Mind you, the stuff straight out of the bowl was goooood. That's what a test run is for I guess. Next time gadget, next time.