Chocolate-Espresso Dacquoise

Happy 2021 everyone! 

This dessert, which has been on my to-do list for years, was my last big project of 2020. I started preparing it a few days before NYE so we could enjoy it before sending 2020 off with a swift kick in the ass. And it was a great sendoff as we stuffed ourselves with prime rib (recipe coming soon!), potato and leek al forno, and butter-basted whole mushrooms. 

First off you are probably asking yourself, what kind of dessert is that? It's called a dacquoise, which in this case is an almond and hazelnut meringue with layers of coffee buttercream and chocolate ganache. And yes, it's as delicious as it sounds.

The meringue is super crispy when you bake it, but as it sits over time, the buttercream and ganache soften it's texture to the point where it's tender but still has a little bit of crisp to it. Each bite is guaranteed to make you go hmmmmmm.

I've made a ton of cakes and desserts before, but this might be one of the most fancy, French-style bakery treats I've ever made. It's sweet but not overly so, with a phenomenal texture. Basically it's a flavor explosion in your mouth! Oh, and it's naturally gluten free as meringue requires no flour to make.

But we're friends here, so I won't lie to you—this recipe is a bit of a pain in the ass to prepare. None of the individual components are insanely challenging. But there are 3 things to be mindful of if you want to make this recipe: (1) working with meringue, (2) all the chilling time, and (3) the pain of using ganache and sliced almonds to decorate the dacquoise.

The meringue

This was actually my first time making a nut meringue and it was quite easy to make/bake. But it is the slicing of the giant meringue slab that requires a large serrated knife (a bread knife is ideal) and patience. You're basically slowly slicing a large rectangular piece of meringue into 4 strips that you'll layer to make the long and skinny dacquoise. It's crumbly at times and prone to breaking. No worries though if your pieces break or crack a bit. One of mine did and it's totally fine! It all gets layered anyways and nobody will be the wiser.

The chilling time

You also need to prepare this dessert over multiple days, as there are a handful of long chilling steps. I recommend starting the dacquoise 2 to 3 days before you want to eat it. You can do it in an abbreviated time frame, but there is a total of 8½ hours cooling/chilling time, so consider this your warning if you don't want to follow my suggestions below. 

• Day 1: Make the meringue and the pastry cream (for your buttercream).
• Day 2: Make the buttercream and ganache; assemble the dacquoise.
• Day 3: Decorate the dacquoise.
• Day 3 or 4: Eat your dacquoise. You can eat your dacquoise on Day 3 if you finish it at least 3 hours before your event; if not, enjoy it on Day 4. 

The decorating

If you're interested in making this dessert I have one piece of advice for you: don't stress about it! If it looks like a hot mess after you're done nobody will care. (You can't totally tell, but my layers were not 100% even as it slopes a bit up top.) I did read some reviews on different ways to get the almonds to stick to the sides of the cake, but I'm including the directions from Cooks Illustrated in my recipe below. But no matter what your dacquoise looks like, I can guarantee that it will taste great and everyone will love it!

Yours in tackling all the fun baking projects, one crazy year at a time

Jacqueline

Chocolate-Espresso Dacquoise, from Cooks Illustrated

Serves: 12 - 14 

Time: 3¾ hours, plus 1½ hours cooling and 7 hours chilling

Note: You must watch this video of America's Test Kitchen making the dacquoise. It is particularly helpful for when you need to slice your meringue and when you need to assemble the dacquoise. 
https://www.americastestkitchen.com/episode/406-a-fancy-finale

I also have helpful tips in the blog post above for tackling this recipe. Namely: I recommend starting the dacquoise 2 to 3 days before your event, so that is how I've broken out the steps below. I've also included some process photos below that I hope will help! But the video will be super helpful as well.

Ingredients

Meringue

¾ cup blanched sliced almonds, toasted

½ cup hazelnuts, toasted and skinned

1 tablespoon cornstarch

⅛ teaspoon salt

1 cup (7 ounces) sugar, divided into two ½ cups

4 large egg whites, room temperature

¼ teaspoon cream of tartar

Coffee buttercream

¾ cup whole milk

4 large egg yolks

⅓ cup (2 1/3 ounces) sugar

1 ½ teaspoons cornstarch

¼ teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons amaretto or water

1 ½ tablespoons instant espresso powder

16 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

Chocolate ganache

6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped fine (~60% cocoa)

¾ cup heavy cream

2 teaspoons corn syrup

12 or 14 whole hazelnuts, toasted and skinned (to skin, place warm nuts in clean dish towel and rub gently; I used Trader Joe's toasted hazelnuts and skinned them as best as I could)

1 cup blanched sliced almonds, toasted (Trader Joe's has these as well!)

Directions

DAY 1: make meringue and pastry cream

1. FOR THE MERINGUE: Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 250 degrees. Using ruler and pencil, draw 13 by 10 1/2-inch rectangle on piece of parchment paper. Grease baking sheet and place parchment on it, ink side down.
2. Process almonds, hazelnuts, cornstarch, and salt in food processor until nuts are finely ground, 15 to 20 seconds. Add 1/2 cup sugar and pulse to combine, 1 to 2 pulses.
3. Using stand mixer fitted with whisk, whip egg whites and cream of tartar on medium-low speed until foamy, about 1 minute. Increase speed to medium-high and whip whites to soft, billowy mounds, about 1 minute. With mixer running at medium-high speed, slowly add remaining 1/2 cup sugar and continue to whip until glossy, stiff peaks form, 2 to 3 minutes. 
4. Fold nut mixture into egg whites in 2 batches. 
5. With offset spatula, spread meringue evenly into 13 by 10 1/2-inch rectangle on parchment, using lines on parchment as guide. Using spray bottle, evenly mist surface of meringue with water until glistening. 
6. Bake for 1 1/2 hours. Turn off oven and allow meringue to cool in oven for 1 1/2 hours. (Do not open oven during baking and cooling.) Remove from oven and let cool to room temperature, about 10 minutes. 
7. Carefully invert meringue and peel off parchment paper. Reinvert meringue and place on cutting board. Using serrated knife and gentle, repeated scoring motion, trim edges of meringue to form 12 by 10-inch rectangle. Discard trimmings. Note: Slice your meringue VERY SLOWLY in this step and don't rush it. Don't "saw" back-and-forth with your knife; instead, slice in only one direction using a scoring motion. Make sure to watch video I linked to above from ATK; start at around 12:30 into the video to watch her trimming and cutting the meringue into 4 pieces.
8. With long side of rectangle parallel to counter, use ruler to mark both long edges of meringue at 3-inch intervals. Using serrated knife, score surface of meringue by drawing knife toward you from mark on top edge to corresponding mark on bottom edge. Repeat scoring until meringue is fully cut through. Repeat until you have four 10 by 3-inch rectangles. (If any meringues break during cutting, use them as middle layers.)
9. Cooled meringue can be kept at room temperature, tightly wrapped in plastic wrap, for up to 2 days.
   
   
10. FOR THE BUTTERCREAM (PART 1): Heat milk in small saucepan over medium heat until just simmering. 
11. Meanwhile, whisk yolks, sugar, cornstarch, and salt in bowl until smooth. 
12. Remove milk from heat and, whisking constantly, add half of milk to yolk mixture to temper. Whisking constantly, return tempered yolk mixture to remaining milk in saucepan. 
13. Return saucepan to medium heat and cook, whisking constantly, until mixture is bubbling and thickens to consistency of warm pudding, 3 to 5 minutes. Transfer pastry cream to bowl. Cover and refrigerate until set, at least 2 hours or up to 24 hours. 

DAY 2: make buttercream and ganache; assemble the dacquoise

1. FOR THE BUTTERCREAM (PART 2): Stir together amaretto and espresso powder; set aside. Remove pastry cream from refrigerator and warm gently to room temperature in microwave at 50 percent power, stirring every 10 seconds. 
2. Using stand mixer fitted with paddle, beat butter at medium speed until smooth and light, 3 to 4 minutes. Add pastry cream in 3 batches, beating for 30 seconds after each addition. Add amaretto mixture and continue to beat until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes longer, scraping down bowl thoroughly halfway through mixing.
   
   
3. FOR THE GANACHE: Place chocolate in heatproof bowl. Bring cream and corn syrup to simmer in small saucepan over medium heat. Pour cream mixture over chocolate and let stand for 1 minute. Stir mixture until smooth. Set aside to cool until chocolate mounds slightly when dripped from spoon, about 5 minutes.
   
   
4. TO ASSEMBLE: Note: I'll show a few pictures of this process below. Again, the ATK video really helps to visualize everything here. Start watching at around 14:30 for the assembly.
5. Place the 4 rectangles on wire rack set in rimmed baking sheet. The order of the pieces will depend on the quality of the meringue. Starting from the left: Piece 1=your bottom layer. Pieces 2 and 3= your center layers (use any broken pieces here). Piece 4=your top layer. Make sure the smoother side on piece 4 is facing DOWN, as this will be the top of your dacquoise. 
6. Using offset spatula, spread 1/4 cup ganache evenly over surface of meringues 2, 3, and 4. Refrigerate until ganache is firm, about 15 minutes. Refrigerate remaining ganache for tomorrow (decoration of dacquoise).
7. Using offset spatula, spread top of Piece 1 with 1/2 cup buttercream. 
8. Invert Piece 2 and place on top of the buttercream on Piece 1; press gently to level. 
9. Repeat, spreading meringue (Piece 2) with 1/2 cup buttercream and topping with inverted ganache-coated meringue (Piece 3). Repeat: Spread top (of Piece 3) with buttercream. Invert final ganache-coated strip (Piece 4) on top of cake. 
10. Use 1 hand to steady top of cake and spread half of remaining buttercream to lightly coat sides of cake, then use remaining buttercream to coat top of cake. Smooth until cake resembles box.
11. Refrigerate until buttercream is firm, about 2 hours. (Once buttercream is firm, assembled cake may be wrapped tightly in plastic and refrigerated for up to 2 days.)

Step 6: ganache on Pieces 2, 3, and 4 only

Steps 7: buttercream on Piece 1

Step 8: Flipping Piece 2 and stacking on Piece 1.

Step 9: Adding buttercream to the "naked" meringue
and repeating the flipping/stacking of pieces

DAY 3: decorate the dacquoise

1. DECORATE: Warm remaining ganache in heatproof bowl set over barely simmering water, stirring occasionally, until mixture is very fluid but not hot. (You can also do this in the microwave if you use very times at half power.)
2. Keeping assembled cake on wire rack, pour ganache over top of cake. Using offset spatula, spread ganache in thin, even layer over top of cake, letting excess flow down sides. Spread ganache over sides in thin layer (top must be completely covered, but some small gaps on sides are OK).
3. Garnish top of cake with the 12 to 14 hazelnuts, depending on how many servings you want (1 hazelnut per serving). Holding bottom of cake with 1 hand, gently press almonds onto sides with other hand. 
4. Chill on wire rack, uncovered, for at least 3 hours or up to 12 hours.

DAY 3 or 4: eat the dacquoise

1. Transfer to platter. Cut into slices with sharp knife that has been dipped in hot water and wiped dry before each slice. Serve.