Dobos Torte is usually very complicated. This recipe simplifies the process leaving you with one of the most amazing chocolate cakes that exist!
what is Dobos Torte?
Dobos Torte is classic; it’s elegant, and it never fails to totally enrapture chocolate lovers. As a bonus I have frozen it and shipped it across the country with great success! I simply ship it in the pan after assembling. If I feel the urge to impress with dessert, I bring out this recipe and with it, my grandmother’s elegant style of entertaining.
The cake is rich, calling for more eggs than flour, and is soaked in a velvety chocolate sauce full of butter that is like no other chocolate sauce I have ever had. To me this will always be the chocolate cake to end all chocolate cakes.
As you are planning your holiday menu, consider making one of these to bring out with your feast. It can be made several days in advance and your chocolate lovers will swoon.
The History of Dobos Torte
The history of this cake predates me by many years. A confectioner named Jozsef C. Dobos created this unique cake and introduced it in 1885 at the National General Exhibition of Budapest. Empress Elisabeth and her husband Franz Joseph I were some of the first to taste it. The cake quickly gained popularity and spread throughout Europe.
Today there are over 100 variations and it is still considered an elegant pastry. Sometimes I come across Dobos Torte for sale in fancy food catalogues for over $100 and I have to laugh. My version tastes way better and is significantly cheaper to make.
Making a Simpler Dobos Torte
This chocolate masterpiece came into my family through my grandmother, Elizabeth Anderson (no relation to the Empress but an Empress in her own right). She used a recipe from Thoughts for Food – America’s Favorite Menu Cookbook by the Houghton Mifflin Company. The book was first published in 1938 and is now out of print.
Grandma Elizabeth was a kitchen genius and made many changes to this recipe. She died when I was 11 but I remember her teaching me how fold the egg whites into the Dobos Torte batter. I never beat egg whites without thinking of that cooking lesson in her St. Paul kitchen.
Over the years I have made many more changes to her technique. At last it is perfect – a recipe any cook easily reproduce to create this famous pastry. I love that my grandmother’s cooking lives again through this recipe that we both worked on in different decades.
Dobos Torte: Chocolate Cake Extraordinaire
Ingredients
- For The Cake
- 1 cup flour
- 7 eggs separated
- 1/8 tsp. salt
- 1 cup powdered sugar
For the Chocolate Sauce
- 1 pound semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 6 eggs
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- 1 pound butter
- 1 tsp. vanilla
Instructions
- To Make The Cake: Preheat oven to 375F.
- Separate the eggs.
- In a large mixing bowl, beat egg yolks, salt, and sugar until thick.
- In a stand mixer, beat the egg whites on high until they are stiff / glossy and hold a good peak. Do not overbeat (they should not look crumbly and dry).
- Stir 1/4 of the egg whites into the egg/sugar mixture. Mix the batter until it is totally smooth. This will lighten the batter and make it easier to protect the air in the rest of the whites.
- Fold in the rest of the egg whites and the flour using a large rubber spatula. Be careful to retain as much air as possible in the batter.
- Line a 9 1/4 x 5 1/4 x 2 3/4 inch Large Loaf Pan with one long sheet of parchment paper. Press the paper into the pan, creasing it at the interior edges and folding the extra over the side of the pan. It is fine if it overhangs every edge by a few inches.
- Pour batter into the lined pan. Bake in a preheated oven for about 40 minutes. Remove when cake tester comes out bone dry. When done, remove the pan to a rack and allow the cake to cool. The cake will shrink down as it cools.
- When the cake is cool enough to cut (about an hour) use a breadknife to shave off any very dark brown patches on the sides, bottom and top. Do this as much or as little as you like. I prefer to shave most of the dark brown off. Discard the brown bits and slice the cake horizontally into slices about one third of an inch thick. You should get 6-8 slices out of the cake.
- To Make The Sauce: Melt chocolate in a double boiler or the microwave. If you melt it in the microwave, stir at 30 second intervals until it is fully melted. Set aside
- Mix eggs and sugar in a large sauce pan over medium heat. This can be done by hand with a whisk but a hand mixer on high is preferred.
- Add the chocolate to the egg mixture and stir to combine. Continue to cook - stirring constantly- until the mixture becomes very warm to the touch. Do not overcook as the egg will cook into chunks.
- Turn the heat down to low and stir in the butter and vanilla.
- Clean and dry the bread pan used to bake the cake. Line it with plastic wrap so that the entire pan is lined and wrap hangs over all four edges of the pan a little bit.
- Ladle some warm chocolate sauce into the bottom of the pan. The layer of the cake you put into the pan first will become the top. Place the bottom of the cake into the pan. Ladle chocolate sauce over, spreading a little so that there is a thick layer of sauce between every layer of cake. Continue to add cake and sauce until all the layers have been used. If the last layer has risen unevenly set it aside with a little sauce to eat as the cook's portion! The last layer of the cake should be covered with chocolate sauce. Reserve about 1 cup or so of the sauce to touch up your cake later as desired.
- Cover the pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate for several hours or overnight until the chocolate sauce has set firm and the cake is chilled through.
- Remove the plastic wrap that covers the top of the cake. Place a serving platter over the cake and flip over so the cake rests on the platter. Gently peel the rest of the plastic wrap from the cake. If the chilled sauce acts "gooey" use a paring knife to separate it from the plastic wrap. A few tablespoons of sauce will be left on the plastic wrap after it has been removed. Use the knife to gently smooth the sides and top of the cake. Add additional sauce from what you held in reserve if any bits of cake become exposed.
- Serve in thin slices. Store refrigerated. Leftovers can be frozen for a few months if wrapped carefully.
Helpful Recipe Notes
Your Rating Matters
When you leave a comment or star rating, it means more than you might think. It helps me understand what you’re enjoying, builds trust for other readers, and supports real, tested cooking content. If you have a moment, I’d truly appreciate you sharing your experience. - Mirlandra
A Note on Nutrition
Nutritional info is an imperfect estimate. Please take it with a grain of salt.
I read each and every comment and I try to respond to questions asap, so ask away! If you’ve made a recipe, I would love to hear about it! Please come back and share your experience and give the recipe a 5-star rating so other people will know how much you loved it!
Kathy Clark says
I made this for Thanksgiving. All of us, grandkids included, enjoyed it so much. The frosting is so chocolatey. Yum!
Mirlandra says
What a fun treat to share with them! My brother made it for Thanksgiving too (he calls Thanksgiving “Dessert Day”.)
The Better Baker says
Yes please! Looks beautiful and no doubt, tastes amazing. Thanks so much for sharing with us at Weekend Potluck.
Mirlandra says
Thanks – hard to go wrong when a LOT of chocolate and butter get together in a cake 🙂
Carol says
I am waiting on a new oven , and in the process I am storing up a few great recipes to try. This is definitely at the top of my list. I have been looking for something great for valentine’s and chocolate is always great, no matter what. I love the method described, and I think it will be a chocolate- lover’s dream come true. Come on new oven!
Mirlandra says
A new oven sounds like a wonderful treat! We are real chocolate nuts and this is one of our special favorites. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do!
Aimee says
I made this cake for my Hungarian mother-in-law for her birthday. My husband would go to a small bakery in Hungary and order Dobos Torte when he visited there. He told me that this recipe tastes just like the Hungarian bakery cake. The only thing I did differently was substitute almond flour for regular flour as that is how it is traditionally made. Thank you for making this traditional confection accessible to American home bakers 💗.
Mirlandra says
Oh Aimee! What a wonderful story! Thank you so much. My grandmother used to make this cake with me when I was a child and it has a lot of sentimental value to me. I imagine the almond flour is excellent here and now I want to try that! Thank you for sharing your lovely history with the cake and your success cooking it.
R says
This sounds like a wonderfull chocolate cake , but please don’t call it a Dobos because it has nothing to do with one . Merry Christmas .
Mirlandra Neuneker says
Thank you, it is a wonderful cake. As with many recipes this one has become my family version of what a Dobos Torte is. The recipe goes back three generations in my family. It might not be the right fit for what you are looking for but it is our beloved Dobos.