Torta Caprese: Italian Almond Cake Recipe With Chocolate
Italian Chocolate Almond Cake Recipe: Authentic Torta Caprese
Chocolate lovers, I want to share with you my favorite chocolate cake that I’m sure will become your favorite, too.
Caprese al cioccolato is a traditional cake from the beautiful island of Capri. The geographic origin is where Italian torta caprese gets its name, not to be confused with tomatoes and mozzarella…
My daughter with an Italian chocolate cake decorated for Spring
Read on for my secrets, learned over the years, to keep the cake moist while baking. Or better yet, cook alongside me in my Torta Caprese chocolate almond cake class (pre-recorded)!
For the cake
- 200 g / 7 oz 70% dark chocolate bars, broken in pieces
- 200 g / ¾ cup unsalted butter, cut in cubes and cold from the fridge
- 90 g / ½ cup caster sugar
- 225 g / 1 ¾ cups almonds, raw, unpeeled
- 90 g / ¾ cup “00” double zero flour, (we recommend weighing it)
- 16 g / 1 Tbsp baking powder
- 6 eggs
For topping
- Icing sugar
- 2 cups of fruit or berries of your choice
Tools to have on hand:
- Round cake pan 25cm / 10 inches diameter
- Blender or food processor
- Electric hand mixer or whisk
- Small saucepan or melting pot
- Large bowl
- Wooden spoon
- Sifter
- Spatula
- Knife
- Serving plate
- Parchment paper
Ingredients Notes:
For chocolate, avoid using chocolate chips. Try to find a good quality of dark chocolate, with at least 70 – 80 percent cocoa, without any other flavoring and made only with a few ingredients.
Authentic torta caprese recipes come from Neapolitan tradition. They use high quality melted dark chocolate, butter, sugar, eggs, and almond flour.
It’s a simple and easy chocolate cake recipe!
I make this chocolate cake at my home in Tuscany all the time, including for cooking classes.
The Caprese almond flour chocolate cake uses ground almonds, which you can grind in food processor or blender.
The recipe I use also calls for a small amount of 00 (double zero) flour. However, you can easily substitute with gluten-free flour or more ground almonds for a flourless cake.
If using pre-made almond flour, finer is better. But don’t worry if it’s not perfectly fine or uniform, especially when grinding the almonds yourself. It all works out in the end.
As a matter of fact, this Italian dessert may be one of the first gluten-free cakes in history! Rumor has it, a baker on the island of Capri ran out of flour (or forgot to add it), and now we have torta caprese.
For the best results, it’s important to check the cake while it’s baking. Timing is everything for this chocolate almond cake recipe.
Once baked, the Caprese cake should be both light in texture but still quite moist inside. The surface of the cake will be almost crispy while the inside is soft.
As an architect, garnishing my cakes is always one of my favorite things to do.
In addition to powdered sugar, I like to make use of seasonal fruit or edible flowers to add some color.
In Italian chocolate torta also goes well with a scoop of gelato or vanilla ice cream.
By the way, this easy chocolate almond cake recipe can also be made with white chocolate and a little citrus. It’s equally delicious.
Let me know if you try Italian torta caprese with dark chocolate or white chocolate.
Torta Caprese - Almond Chocolate Cake
Equipment
- Round cake pan 25cm / 10 inches diameter
- Blender or food processor
- Electric hand mixer or whisk
- Small saucepan or melting pot
- Large bowl
- Wooden spoon
- Knife
- Serving plate
- Parchment paper
Ingredients
For the cake
- 300 g dark chocolate bars - broken in pieces
- 200 g unsalted butter - cut in cubes and cold from the fridge
- 90 g caster sugar
- 225 g almonds - raw, unpeeled
- 90 g 00 double zero flour - (we recommend weighing it)
- 16 g baking powder
- 6 eggs
For topping
- Icing sugar
- 2 cups of fruit or berries of your choice
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180°C / 360°F.
- Line a round cake pan with parchment paper. Set aside.
Melt the chocolate and the butter
- In a small pot, melt the chocolate and the butter over low heat, stirring continuously.The success of the cake depends mostly on the way the chocolate and butter are melted, at a very low temperature and without burning the chocolate.
- When the butter and chocolate mixture is melted, turn the heat off and set aside to cool down.
Grind the almonds
- In a blender or food processor, mix the almonds and 1/3 of the sugar until the almonds are finely ground and you get a flour-like texture.
Make the batter
- In a large bowl, add the eggs and the remaining sugar. Whip very well with a whisk or a handheld electric beater, until they are light in color and foamy. It will take about 5 minutes.
- Add the almond-sugar mixture and continue mixing for another 3 minutes until this mixture is well incorporated with the eggs.
- Add the chocolate and butter mixture and keep mixing for about 2-3 minutes, until everything is well combined.
- With a sifter, sprinkle the flour on the batter. Mix quickly with the whisk or the electric beater. To have a fluffy cake, don’t over mix, just run your mixing tool until the ingredients are combined. When over-mixing, the flour develops gluten, causing a rubbery cake texture.
- Again with the sifter, add baking powder. Mix quickly again, until baking powder is combined with the other ingredients.
Bake the cake
- With a spatula, transfer the batter into the cake pan. Tilt the cake pan on one side and then the other to spread the batter around for an even surface.
- Bake the cake in the lower half of the oven for about 30 minutes at 180°C / 350°F.
- The cake is done when inserting a knife in the center, it comes out slightly ‘dirty’, with a little bit of moist crumbs. Don’t over-bake. The line between an over-baked dry cake and a perfectly-baked moist cake is very thin, so keep an eye on it. The final texture of the cake should be dense, moist, and fudgy. Not dry.
Serve the cake
- When the cake is done, take it out from the oven and let it cool for 10 minutes.
- Remove the cake from the pan, inverting it onto the serving plate with the bottom up. Having the bottom of the cake up will hide the eventual imperfections on the top side.
- Pull off the parchment paper and sprinkle the cake with powdered sugar. Make sure the cake is cold before adding the sugar. If hot, the sugar will be soaked up by the cake.
- Decorate the top of the cake with fruits or berries, and serve.
Notes
- For topping the cake, I usually make use of seasonal fruit to add a touch of color and to balance the richness of the cake with some acidity and freshness.
In springtime, I love red berries such as strawberries, red currants or raspberries, as their vibrant red color matches with the dark brown of the chocolate. In summer, apricots have a wonderful taste and color to pair with this cake. In the fall, I love to use green grapes, cut in half and mixed with other fruits.
- Another great addition to serving Torta Caprese is a dollop of vanilla ice cream.
- Having a moist texture, this cake keeps well for 3-4 days.
You can also freeze it once cooked and keep it in the freezer for up to a month. When you’re ready to eat it, thaw the cake overnight in the refrigerator, then warm it up in the oven at 50°C / 120°F.
- Depending on the oven, sometimes the heat can come mostly from the upper part. To prevent the top of the cake from burning, you can add a large metal pan (larger than the cake pan) on one of the oven racks placed over the baking cake. This will prevent the top of the cake from cooking too fast and then burning.