Zuccotto

It must be 20 years since I last made this well known Italian dessert. I couldn't cut into it for the photo to show the filling as I was taking it to a friends house for dinner. In the middle is a mixture of cream and chopped nuts, then an extra addition of chocolate, cream and nuts in the very centre. Looking at different recipes for Zuccotto it is suggested that the whole dessert can be frozen and just left to come up to room temperature before serving, so the centre is more like an ice cream. I followed a recipe that I have had stuck in my personal recipe book which is accompanied by a little drawing for guidance (see below). I obviously made it in a dish that was way too small as I had a huge amount of cream left over.

Ingredients
Serves 8
100g Almonds
100g Hazelnuts
400g Madeira cake, cut into slices
Sherry
Orange juice
1 pint of double cream
100g Icing sugar
100g Dark chocolate, melted

Method
Roast the nuts until lightly browned and then chop in a processor. Put to one side.
Grease a 4 pint pudding dish, line with cling film. Use ⅔ of the cake to the line the entire dish making sure there are no spaces. Pour the liqueurs into the cake and refrigerate while you do the next stage. Whip the cream, icing sugar and then add the nuts. Keep some of the cream back to mix with the chocolate.  Fold the melted chocolate in with the remaing cream. Make a well in the centre of the cream and add the chocolate cream. Place the rest of the cake on top of the cream mixture. Press down and refrigerate for six hours. Then tip out onto a serving dish and sprinkle with cocoa powder. Keep chilled or in the freezer until ready to serve.

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