Sachertorte Recipe

I made this for the 'RoyalWedding Party' for the first time, it's the best chocolate cake I've ever made and what's even better is it can be made up to 7 days in advance. The recipe is taken from Green & Black's Chocolate Recipes - hope you'll try it and let me know what you think.

Ingredients for the Torte
melted butter for greasing
200g dark chocolate (min 60% cocoa solids), broken into pieces
6 eggs
310g granulated sugar
150g ground almonds
1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground coffee
6 tablespoons apricot jam

Ingredients for the Icing
100g dark chocolate (min 60% cocoa solids), broken into pieces
40g unsalted butter

Preheat oven to 180 degrees, gas mark 4 and grease a 23cm (9") springform cake tin

To make the torte, melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water. Separate 5 of the eggs, whisk the yolks and the whole egg and the sugar until the mixture is thick and creamy.

In a separate bowl whisk the egg whites until stiff.

Add the ground almonds, coffee grounds and melted chocolate to the egg yolk mixture and stir well. Gently fold in the egg whites and pour into the prepared tin.

Bake for 1 hour, covering the cake with foil after 40 mins to prevent the top from burning. Check that a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean and remove the cake from the oven. Release the springform ring and leave the cake on the base to cool on a wire rack.

Melt the apricot jam over a low heat, strain and brush over the cooled cake.

For the icing, melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water. Add the butter and stir until it has the consistency of thick pouring cream. Pour evenly over the cake, smooth over the top and sides, leave to set.