(Photo-shy) friends came over this weekend, so of course I wanted to feed them something special.  However, I realized the night before that our bountiful berries had just passed their peak and we only had about a quart on the bushes.  How do you make a quart of raspberries feed five people?  Stretch it with chocolate, of course.

Torte ingredients:

• 0.5 cups of almonds
• 2 ounces of dark chocolate
• 2 tablespoons of butter
• 2 eggs
• 0.5 cups of sugar
• 0.75 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder
• 0.5 teaspoons of salt
• 0.5 cups of raspberries
  

Topping ingredients:

• 0.25 cups of heavy cream
• 6 ounces of dark chocolate
• 3.5 cups of raspberries
  

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and butter a 9-by-13-inch cake pan.

Toast the almonds until they're lightly brown, then grind them for about 5 minutes in a food processor until the nuts start to release their oils.  Meanwhile, melt the chocolate and butter in the microwave.

At the same time, beat the two eggs until they're fluffy.  Add the sugar to the eggs and continue beating.  Then mix in the almond paste, butter-and-chocolate mixture, flour, baking powder, and salt.  Once the batter is thoroughly mixed, lightly fold in the raspberries, trying not to break them apart.

Pour the batter into the pan, spread to cover the whole bottom, then bake until a knife comes out clean.  (This won't take long since the batter is such a thin layer.  I didn't time it though; sorry.  Maybe 10 minutes?)

While the cake is baking, heat the cream in a saucepan over medium-high heat until it just boils.  Remove from the heat, stir in the chocolate, and continue stirring until the chocolate melts and mixes with the cream.

Once the cake is done, spread the chocolate-and-cream mixture over top, then sprinkle on fresh raspberries generously.  (We had a couple of blackberries and included them, and I'll be blueberries would be equally delicious.)  Cool for a few hours to set the chocolate. 

Serves about 10 and combines the taste of fresh and cooked raspberries with rich chocolate and nutty almonds, with none of the flavors overwhelming the others.  Definitely a favorite for fresh-fruit and dark-chocolate lovers like me!

(Based loosely on this recipe.)

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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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