Old Vienna III

It's amazing how desensitized you become very quickly. Take eggs for example. Up until now, a good standard cake recipe took two or three eggs. A souffle took more but that was to be expected and you didn't serve it everyday.

I'm having guests on Saturday. They opted to come for dessert. They don't know about my new cook book so I'm a wondering why they didn't want to come for the full fledged meal. They've been before. They survived. They said they enjoyed it. No matter, I had an occasion to use my new cook book. I could spring it on them.

I spent several evening going through the cake section of the book. I was trying to decide whether I should cook a layer cake - using 6 separate cake pans - or one where you had to cut it into three even sized layers. I mused over the different flavour combinations and the different construction techniques. And I noticed my tolerance level for the number of eggs used increasing, 5 eggs, 7 eggs, 8 eggs, 9 eggs and counting. When I finally settled on a recipe, I had reached the 10 egg level. Not that the fact that I needed 10 eggs bothered me, I was annoyed by the fact that I needed 8 egg yolks and 10 egg whites. What type of recipe, other than meringue, doesn't use up the yolks and whites in equal proportions?

I had decided to embark on a Sachertorte. A quick google search revealed it to be a famous recipe from a hotel of which the original is a heavily guarded secret. None of the knock-offs I could find were as rich as mine. Then again, the author of my book seems to think that everyone had their own personal hen coop. The cinching factor was that my book said the original Sachertorte was not cut in half. I decided to ignore the fact that every other recipe had two halves. Squinting at the picture on the hotel's website also revealed it had filling in the middle of the slice. Bah! They don't know what they're talking about!

So last night I went and bought eggs.

Tonight I separated 10 eggs. I managed to drop the shell halves in the yolk and a yolk in the whites. I got it out whole and started breathing again. I had choosen my bowl for the whites carefully. Egg whites get big when beaten stiff and I imagined 10 egg whites would be huge. They were.

By the end, I realised I was making a giant chocolate souffle. Except that I have to let it rest for 2 days and then I get to smother it with fondant.

Which reminds me, I have to figure out how one makes fondant.

I hope my guests like ice cream. It may be all they're getting.