Cherry Fudge Brownie Torte

This week’s TWD recipe is Cherry Fudge Brownie Torte and was chosen by April of Short & Rose. It’s a shame that there isn’t a photo of this recipe in Dorie’s book as I actually think this has been one of my favourite recipes that we have made so far. In saying that, it was an expensive recipe to make as it had lots of chocolate, butter, mascarpone, cream cheese and cream in it (yes, not the weight watchers special) but it was truly delicious. I probably would have made a scaled down version of this recipe, except we have my in-laws staying with us at the moment and I thought they would enjoy having the leftovers in the fridge for a few days.



This dessert has a very rich brownie base which is studded with dried sour cherries. I have never seen dried sour cherries in the usual places I shop, so I actually used bottled cherries. This also meant that I left out the step where you flambéed the dried cherries in kirsch – the most challenging part of the recipe. I think I probably preferred the canned cherries in the tort as I don’t like dried fruit. I also got the opportunity to open my beautiful jar of French cherry preserves which I bought at the food show a few months ago.



The topping is a decadent mixture of cream cheese, mascarpone, sugar and cream – like a cheesecake topping, but not too sweet – the sweetness comes from the brownie base. Dorie suggested decorating the top of the torte with pureed cherry preserves. However, I didn’t really want to use my expensive French preserves for that, so I used raspberry jam – completely different flavour I know, but it did have the visual effect I was after. Christmas is at our place this year and I think that I may make a raspberry version of the torte for Christmas, using fresh raspberries instead of the cherries and then decorating the top of the torte with fresh raspberries.

I loved this recipe and will definitely be making this again. See if the other TWDers loved it as much as we did here.