The Piedmont region of Italy is the origin of this refreshing cuisine. It’s ideal as an appetizer or a light summer supper. This is how hard-boiled eggs were used in the original recipe. Although some recipes call for mayonnaise, this is the real deal. Serve alongside a dry, crisp white wine.
| Prep Time: | 1 hr |
| Cook Time: | 30 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr 30 mins |
| Servings: | 16 |
| Yield: | 1 to 9 – layer inch cake |
Ingredients
- 1 ¾ cups cake flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup ground walnuts
- 1 ½ cups heavy cream
- 1 ½ cups white sugar
- 3 eggs
- 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
- 1 cup white sugar
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups heavy cream
- 1 (12 ounce) jar raspberry preserves
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour two 9 inch pans. In a medium bowl mix together the flour, baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon salt and ground walnuts. Set aside. In a small bowl whip 1 1/2 cups cream until stiff peaks form. Set aside.
- In a large bowl combine 1 1/2 cups sugar, eggs and 3 teaspoons vanilla. Beat 5 minutes at highest speed of an electric mixer. fold in flour mixture alternately with whipped cream.
- Pour batter into prepared pans. Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 15 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.
- To make the Frosting: In a large bowl combine cream cheese, 1 cup sugar 1/8 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Beat until smooth. In a separate small bowl, whip 1/12 cups whipping cream until stiff peaks form. Fold whipped cream into cream cheese mixture.
- To assemble cake: Split each layer in half horizontally to form 4 layers. Place 1 layer on serving plate; spread with 1/2 cup frosting. Top with second layer; spread with 1/2 cup preserves. Top with 3rd layer; spread with 1/2 cup frosting. Top with remaining cake layer. Frost sides of cake with frosting, reserving about 1 cup for decorating. Spread remaining preserves on top of cake. Using a pastry bag and a star tip, pipe reserved frosting in a lattice design on the top of cake, pipe border around top and bottom edges of cake. Store in refrigerator.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 442 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 59 g |
| Cholesterol | 96 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 5 g |
| Saturated Fat | 11 g |
| Sodium | 204 mg |
| Sugars | 44 g |
| Fat | 22 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
This is an excellent cake, I will be making it for my mother’s birthday this week. The recipe I have came from a Pillsbury “Cakes Unlimited” mini cookbook purchased at the supermarket checkout stand at least 30 years ago. Your recipe doesn’t show the photo in that book or described in your recipe. It has a lattice type top, frosting piped over the raspberry preserves on the top. Anyway it’s done, it is very good.
I added a pint of crushed fresh raspberries to the jam. What a wonderful enhancement of the raspberry flavor. This is by far one of my favorite cakes.
Fantastic recipe! Just sweet enough without being too sweet (I followed the recipe exactly, though I only spread a thin layer of the preserves on the top, or it would have been too sweet for me). Thanks to the folks who gave the tip about using parchment paper in the pans – I followed their advice and the cakes came out easily. Here’s a tip for slicing the layers easily and cleanly, since a lot of people had problems with that: use thread instead of a knife. It has to be strong thread – nylon, not cotton. You cut a piece of thread, wrap an end around each index finger, like dental floss (come to think of it, that would probably work too) and slice each layer horizontally with it. Works like a charm (works great for slicing dough too). Many thanks for the recipe, Tom – this cake not only tastes wonderful, it looks wonderful too!
very very dry but the flavour is amazing.
everyone liked it. No changes in the recipe. followed exactly. Walnuts were toasted before grinding
Came out great. I followed the recipe pretty closely. I substituted strawberry jam for raspberry (because that’s what I had on hand) and used ground almonds instead of walnuts. Cake was firm but surprisingly moist and very flavorful. I think I actually liked the cake even better than the frosting (which isn’t normally the case for me).
Heaven on a plate! I made this for my daughter’s birthday and I was so very happy with how it turned out. Everyone loved it, from my 4 year old grandson to my 73 year old mother. The only thing I did differently was to make an extra half batch so that I could have 3 layers of significance. I did this after seeing how much the full batch made and decided against cutting them in half and just add another layer instead. This will be a cake that I will make many times in the future!
This was a surprisingly exquisite cake that was surprisingly easy to make. Quite a sophisticated texture and flavor. This will become a standard cake recipe!
Used the frosting from this recipe for a strawberry cake. This frosting is TOO DIE FOR!
i left out the walnuts and turned it into a bunch of mini cupcake sized tortes and it was a huge hit with everybody
I made this torte to take to a German restaurant when we had company from Germany. It was the perfect dessert for the occasion. I did 3- 8″ by making 1 1/2 batches and doing 6 layers. My friend from Germany even requested the recipe. Thank you for the recipe, it’s a keeper!
This torte/cake was a lot of work for me, which is saying something since I made an Inside out German Choc. Cake that took four hours! While this didn’t take nearly as long, the process of splitting the layers and trying to make the thing look presentable was a challenge. I found the cake rather crumbly (but not dry), therefore not so easy to separate. They also sunk in the middle making the process of getting “even” layers very difficult. Not sure if this is due to the high altitude where I live as I sometimes have issues with this when baking. My suggestion from what I learned, split the batter into four parts instead of two and adjust the cooking time to less to avoid having to cut the layers up. Also to get them out of the pan easily I highly recommend lining the bottoms of the pan with parchment paper, I did this and they came out without a problem. I made the recipe exactly how it was written except I used almonds instead of walnuts and added a little bit of almond extract instead of vanilla to the frosting. It tasted good but I wouldn’t say it was “to die for” since I found the texture a little odd and not as elegant tasting (if that makes sense) as I would have liked. Perhaps this could be cured by grinding the nuts finer. I also prefer fresh fruit instead of preserves since I find preserves too sweet. I’m not sure I want to go through the trouble of making this again, but other people really enjoyed it so I might.
My husband made this for my birthday because I love raspberries -it was a hit.
Tasted SO good. Even my cake hating boyfriend loved this. However I found the cake almost impossible to cut into 4 layers without breaking. Good thing the iceing was forgiving! Looked great topped with fresh raspberrys.
Very good cake with a beautiful presentation. I like that the walnuts are ground, rather than just chopped.
This cake turned out great!! I used powdered sugar instead of white in the icing, I know it changes the texture, but I don’t like tasting the grains in frosting. I did everything else as written. everyone loved it! It definately was a lot of work, but I did allow my 3 year old son to help which doubles the work, at least. Anyways, well worth the effort, especially when you have a husband who loves it as much as mine does.
This cake is truly fantastic. I even make the raspberry jam from scratch because most store-bought jams are too sweet and not “fruity” enough for me. Women: this cake will yield marriage proposals!!
Awesome cake! We made it with almonds and fresh raspberries, and it was outstanding. I love using cream instead of butter.
I made this for a party and it was a huge sucess. Used crushed almonds instead – very good. Also had trouble getting it out of the pan intact even though well greased. Luckily, frosting is forgiving 🙂
This cake was amazingly delicious. The recipe for the icing alone makes it spectacular. It’s best feature was that it was not overly sweet the way many cakes can be. Made it for a party and it was a HUGE hit.
TREESALIA