Raspberry and Lychee Chocolate Log

I’ve been threatening to translate this recipe from the original French for a while now, and so here it is. This is the third year I’ve made this delicious dessert for Christmas, although let it be known that it can be done for any special occasion and no one will think ‘why is there a Christmas dessert on the table?’ even if it’s in the middle of summer.

This recipe may look impressive but it is in fact very easy to make. The cake itself only takes 10 minutes to bake and is then filled and covered with chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate.

• Serves 10 people
• Preparation: 25 mins
• Cooking time: 15 mins
• Resting time: 1 hour for the chocolate ganache to set

Ingredients

For the cake:

• 4 eggs
• 100 g sugar
• 100 g flour, sifted
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

For the chocolate ganache:

• 200 g dark chocolate (ideally around 70%)
• 100 mls double cream
• a handful of raspberries, chopped (I used frozen raspberries from the supermarket) plus four whole raspberries for decoration
• a handful of lychees, chopped (most supermarkets have them in tins)

For the chocolate icing:

• 100 g dark chocolate (again, 70% is preferable)
• 50 mls double cream
• 25 g glucose (for the shine)

or if you don’t have glucose (like me)

• 100 g dark chocolate
• 100 mls double cream

Method

1. Prepare the chocolate ganache:

• Bring the double cream to the boil then take off the heat and incorporate the chocolate broken into pieces. Leave it to melt for about 5 minutes and mix well.
• Once it has completely melted, add pieces of raspberry and lychee to the mixture, gently mix together, and keep aside in the fridge.

2. Make the cake:

• Pre-heat the oven at 200°C.
• Separate the egg whites from the yolks. Beat the yolks with the sugar until the mixture whitens, then slowly add the flour.
• Beat the egg whites until they stiffen, then gently add them to the batter.
• On a baking tray, lay some baking paper and spread the batter over it. Lay some raspberry pieces on top of the batter.
• Bake for 8 to 10 minutes at 200°C (keep an eye on it as you don’t want it to burn).

3. As soon as the cake is out of the oven, lay the biscuit out on a damp towel and roll it to help it take shape.

Messy but effective

4. Unroll the cake and spread the chocolate ganache.  Sprinkle lychee pieces on top before rolling the log.

tastes better than it looks I promise!

5. The icing:

Melt the chocolate and cream together in a glass bowl over a pan of boiling water (also known as a bain-marie) and mix well. If you are using glucose, add it at the end away from the heat. Ice the log and decorate as you wish.

Also worth a mention:

• Lychees are not to everyone’s taste but they are actually non-essential to the success of this recipe. No one will be the wiser if you don’t put them in and you don’t need to adjust any quantities.
• In summer, it also works very well with strawberries instead of raspberries.

I hope you like it!

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