Black Forest Cherry Cake

To celebrate the Tag der deutschen Einheit (German reunification day, basically German independence day, celebrated October 3rd), we are making a traditional German recipe. This recipe comes from the Black Forest in southern Germany.

To make a Black Forest Cherry Cake, you need two (or more) thin layers of chocolate cake. I used my vegan chocolate cake. You also need a lot of whipped cream. I whipped a liter, but used around 3/4 of it. I also used a package of cream stabilizer (Sahnesteif, consisting of corn starch) and powdered sugar to stabilize the whipped cream. I used canned cherries, drained. I'm showing a small bottle of Black Forest Cherry Water (Schwarzwälder Kirschwasser), but we didn't use it since this cake will also be eaten by my small children. If you want to use it, it is typically used by soaking the cherries in the schnapps and some people brush it on the cake layers and let it soak in. We also used shaved chocolate to decorate the sides. I bought it because I didn't feel like making it, but you can make it yourself by grating a bar of chocolate with a cheese grater.
 I started out whipping my cream. After it was semi-whipped, I added my cream stabilizer and about half a cup of powdered sugar. Then I finished whipping it to soft peaks.
 I filled the cake with whipped cream and cherries.
 Then I added the second layer of cake and frosted the cake with the whipped cream. At one point, I whipped the cream a bit more to stiff peaks.
 Then I pressed the chocolate shavings into the sides of the cake.
 I piped dollops of cream on top of the cake. They were very soft.
Then I placed some of the best-looking cherries on top of the dollops and a bit more chocolate shavings into the middle.
 I think it turned out lovely. It tasted amazing and was really a piece of German tradition.
 Happy Tag der deutschen Einheit.



To watch the whole process on our YouTube channel, click here: https://youtu.be/TtTFDbX3Mfg
Um das ganze Prozess auf unsere YouTube Sendung zu gucken, klickt hier: https://youtu.be/1KR_CLf4ccY

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