Many people believe that the world-famous Prague cake came to Soviet cuisine from the Czech Republic. Despite the apparent logic of this conclusion, it has no basis: the famous dessert was developed by the head of the Moscow restaurant of the same name Vladimir Guralnik. Chocolate cakes with a delicate cream and fudge were immediately loved by Soviet citizens and quickly spread throughout the Union's pastry shops. At that time, confectioners little thought about how to decorate the cake "Prague": they were limited to butter roses and chocolate icing. Today in free sale you can find mastic, fresh berries, all kinds of toppers and other designs, which can be repeated without difficulty even for an inexperienced housewife.
Confectioner experimenter
Vladimir Mikhailovich Guralnik initially studied confectionery at one of Moscow colleges. Actually, how did he study? I tried to take into account that there is GOST and all the cooks of the Soviet Union should strictly follow it. Vladimir often did not agree with the proportions and sequence of adding the ingredients, but he delicately remained silent, apparently guessing that his time had not come yet.
Then followed a practice in several candy stores, a job at the restaurant "Prague" and a painful growth to the chef. Only having received the coveted position, the man decided on the first experiments.
Despite the complexity of introducing new recipes, Soviet restaurants had the right to experiment, and Guralnik took advantage of this: it is believed that in his life he developed more than 30 original recipes, each of which took its rightful place in GOST.
Viennese cake with a Czech name
But back to Prague. Guralnik, who had studied with his Czechoslovak colleagues for quite some time and was well acquainted with the wrong side of foreign cuisine, decided to take Viennese Sacher chocolate cake as the basis for his new chocolate dessert. Conscience did not allow the confectioner to simply copy the original recipe, replacing the name, so he decided to modify the Viennese pie, adding personality: in this way cream and chocolate fudge were born, which became the hallmark of the Soviet dessert.
The first tests showed that the public took the dessert extremely positively, so soon it was introduced into GOST and could be prepared in any confectionery.
Cream Cake Society
Due to the fact that the original “Prague” was conceived by the Goral as an exquisite dessert, it was very difficult to prepare. In addition, the confectioner needed not only all his talent and skills, but also rare, outlandish products, which it was almost impossible for a mere mortal to get. This primarily related to the alcoholic ingredients of the cake, such as Chartreuse and Benedictine, as well as Cuban rum.
But "Prague" still paced the country, and a few years later, the Soviet housewives called it almost any chocolate cake with butter cream. This explains the incredible amount of a wide variety of desserts under the general name "Prague".
Cooking cakes
And yet, if you want to try the very taste from childhood that all the citizens of the Union loved so much, try not to step back from the Gostovsky recipe.
To make a biscuit, take:
- 5 eggs;
- 170 g of sugar;
- 30 g of softened butter;
- 30 g of alkalized cocoa;
- 120 g of flour;
- 1 tbsp. l Benedictine liquor.
Separate the whites from the yolks, cool and beat until solid peaks, adding 100 g of sugar at the end of whipping. Rub the yolks thoroughly with the remaining sugar. Mix with half the protein mass. Add cocoa to the flour and sift it twice through a fine sieve: this is done in order to saturate the bulk ingredients with oxygen.
Gently mix the flour and yolk mixture, put the remaining proteins in a bowl with the dough and with a spatula bring the dough to a homogeneous state. At this stage, it is strongly recommended not to use a mixer, as there is a great danger of damaging air bubbles and spoiling the biscuit. Add softened butter and liquor to the dough. Shuffle.
Lubricate the split mold with a diameter of approximately 20 cm with butter and sprinkle with flour. The so-called French shirt will not allow the biscuit to stick to the walls of the form. Put the finished dough in the mold and bake in the oven, heated to 200 degrees, for 30 minutes.
A test with a wooden skewer will help to accurately determine the readiness of the cakes. Put the finished biscuit on the wire rack, cool and let stand in a cool place for at least 15 hours.
Impregnation
However, the design of the Prague cake is still a long way off. When the biscuit has completely cooled down and stabilized, it should be cut into three equal parts with a thread and soaked in sugar syrup.
To prepare the impregnation, use 139 g of granulated sugar and 120 ml of water. Put the ingredients in a saucepan, add 1 tbsp to them. l Chartreuse liquor and simmer over medium heat. To find out if the syrup is ready, add one drop of the resulting sugar water to a cup of ice water, and then try rolling a ball out of it. If the syrup is smeared on the fingers, continue to cook, if not, continue to the next step.
Transfer the finished mixture into a bowl and whisk with a white mixer: now the impregnation is ready for use. Apply sugar syrup to the two lower cakes and leave them for 6-7 hours at room temperature.
Cream
Stuffing "Prague" - butter-custard. It is not at all difficult to cook it, however, you must strictly follow the recipe, otherwise it may delaminate and you will have to start all over again. So, mix in a bowl 3 yolks, 1 tsp. boiled water and 7 tbsp. l condensed milk. Put the mixture in a water bath and cook for at least 20 minutes. Once the cream begins to thicken, remove it from the heat and add 70 g of dark chocolate to the bowl. Let it melt and cool the cream itself a little.
After 2-3 hours, add to the future filling 200 g of softened butter, 1 tbsp. l rum and beat thoroughly with a blender. Layers the cake, leaving the sides and top layer dry.
Fruit aroma - a visiting card of Prague
Nevertheless, Guralnik was not such a strong fan of chocolate: in his cake, obvious fruit notes can be traced. Use about 100 g apricot jam to thoroughly smear the top and sides of the dessert. Leave for a couple of hours in the refrigerator. Pour the finished cake with chocolate fondant or icing.
Your "Prague" is ready!
Classic decor
Ready cake is usually covered with fondant. This is a great alternative to melted chocolate. To prepare it, take 4 tbsp. l milk, 1 tbsp. l alkalized cocoa, 150 g sugar, 50 g butter and 1 sachet of vanilla sugar. Put all the ingredients except the butter in a small saucepan, bring to a boil and cook for 8 minutes, stirring constantly.
Remove the pan from the heat and add the butter to the mixture. Punch with a blender. At the same time, hold the device slightly at an angle so that air bubbles do not form in the glaze. Cool the finished fondant to 40 degrees and fill the chilled cake. If the confectionery thermometer was not at hand, it does not matter. Put a little mixture on the inside of the wrist. Fondant should be warm, but not scorching hot.
Leave the cake for 2-3 hours in the refrigerator and you can apply the decor with melted chocolate or ganache. For better contrast, you can use white or, conversely, bitter varieties.
The classic beautiful design of the Prague cake comes down to several lines of bitter and milk chocolate. Many add nuts to the decor or use oil cream to create an original decoration.
The easiest option that even a preschool child will cope with is decoration with melted chocolate. Take a few slices and melt them in a water bath. Transfer the resulting mass into a pastry bag and add various patterns and inscriptions with it.
For children's birthday
If the Prague cake is for a children's birthday, remove alcohol from the recipe. You can decorate it with sugar mastic, which children love so much.
The problem is that the top coating in the form of jam and fudge will not allow the mastic to lie well, so if you cook for children, you will have to move away from the classic patterns.
First of all, refuse jam. In order to decorate the Prague cake for your birthday as well as possible, prepare an butter cream: beat 200 g butter in a mixer until splendid, add 150 g icing sugar and mix again. Now cover the finished cake with the mixture, smooth it well and send it to the refrigerator for 6-8 hours.
Use the paste to create an original design.
For pros
For housewives who are thinking about how to decorate the Prague cake at home and have a good command of a pastry bag with nozzles, there is one very elegant solution.
Prepare ganache, cream cheese or butter cream on condensed milk and use a pastry syringe to create a real garden on the surface of the cake.
In a modern way
Modern confectioners tend to move away from familiar patterns. Perhaps that is why Nude-style cakes decorated with fruits and berries are in fashion today.
To create this option, cream off the cake between the cakes using a carved nozzle. Discard the full glaze, leaving only minor smudges. Garnish the top of the dessert with sliced fruits and berries: strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, kumquat, blackberries and others. You can see a variant of this design of the cake "Prague" in the photo. It always looks unusually fresh and always advantageous.
For real sweet
"Prague", decorated with chocolate, sweets, straws and cookies, is the real dream of any small (and big!) Sweetened. Now in the world of cakes, mess is recognized as an artistic order and is highly regarded in confectionery circles.
And we are only happy about this trend: decorating the Prague cake (and any other) with chocolates is a huge scope for imagination. From an elegant dessert, little sweet lovers will surely pull off the entire decor before you can blow out the candles!
Elegantly
Modern trends in the world of cake making and cake decoration dictate their own rules to confectioners. Today, the decor is not welcomed by excessive pretentiousness and detail, so most fashion baking magazines recommend using toppers - iron, wood or cardboard decorations, which are removed before cutting the dessert.
Toppers are made individually for the order, and are sold ready-made. This is one of the options for decorating the Prague cake at home without much effort and money.
Quickly
One of the options for decorating the Prague cake without spending time and money on it is whipped cream. In this case, you can use the finished mixture from a spray can or take a jar of 30 percent cream and beat them with powdered sugar. Such a simple design organically looks with berries and chocolate chips.
We must not forget that such a dessert should be stored in the refrigerator, otherwise the decorations will flow and spoil not only the appearance, but also the taste.
A cream cake usually looks very nice, although you'll have to work out before you get neat roses.
French
Today, the famous Soviet dessert is known far beyond the borders of the former Union. So, for example, in some confectioneries in France you can find Gâteau de Prague. While the Russian housewives are puzzling over how to decorate the Prague cake beautifully, the French have found a very elegant solution for this.
They use the Swiss meringue for this, which for the color is slightly burned with a burner. This decoration looks fresh and original. In addition, the delicate meringue perfectly sets off the rich chocolate flavor of the cake.
New accents
In search of options for decorating the Prague cake (photos of ready-made desserts are given in the article), one can often see pictures with nut crumbs. Many housewives are afraid to mix two or more bright tastes, but this is a completely vain fear.
Nuts and chocolate perfectly complement each other and look in tandem. Therefore, any of their types are perfectly combined. So, cooked according to the classic Prague recipe, you can decorate with peanut crumbs, whole hazelnuts, pistachios or almond petals. Halves of walnut or cashew are often used.
Before use, be sure to check the nuts for rancidity: this way you will protect yourself and your loved ones, and also do not spoil the whole cake.