Die behrühmt Sachertorte

I realized that in my last post I didn't actually talk about my lazy Sunday, even though I wrote the post on Sunday and included it in my title. So here it is. Sunday I slept in until 11:30, then did my homework in my bed and updated my blog for about four hours, (the whole time staying in bed). There's really not a whole lot to do here on Sunday because nothing is open. If you're out of food, you're just out of luck. In our case we were out of toilet paper on Sunday... yikes. Then I went to the only practice rooms that are open on Sunday and practiced for a few hours. That was about it.

Montag 30 August: Monday was like most days. Went to German, practiced, went grocery shopping (although I did buy microwavable popcorn, which was pretty exciting!) Then at night we went to the Rathaus again and saw Don Giovani. We also got ananas beir, (pineapple beer) which was really good! Then some of the girls got raspberry soaked wine, which was also really good. The production of the opera was really strange. Again, modern like Hansel and Gretel was. There were a lot of scantily clad people and then there was a part where they were all running around with golf clubs and the set was very minimalist. It was also freezing. This week is really cooling down. It's been really rainy Monday and Tuesday.

You start by mixing the cake mix with three eggs and a weird  amount of apricot jam

I don't know how well you can read this, but it's all German! Everything!

I think the next step was to stir for four minutes with low heat...

Here it is unganashed

The end product, lovely huh?

A picture of the real deal, hahaha I wasn't too far off...

Dienstag 31 August: Today was the usual again, but it is also one of my roommate's (Katie's) birthday! So in honor of Katie's birthday I stopped by Spar (a grocery store here) and looked for some sort of cake mix to make a cake. What I found was a mix for Sachertorte, which is a famous Viennese cake. We've learned about it on tours and in my German class. It was invented by a sixteen year old cooking apprentice and was such a hit that eventually he got enough money from selling the cake to buy the hotel he worked at! The hotel like the cake is now named Sacher, after the creator and is located a block away from where I go to school. Anyway today I made my first Sachertorte. Sachertorte is a chocolate cake with an apricot marmelade layer and then covered in chocolate ganash. Making the cake was really challenging though. All the instructions were in German and I had to convert all the measurements... Also it's supposed to be a round cake with two layers, but all we have here is a long rectangular pan, so I had to make it in that pan, then cut it in half and layer it to make a rectangular prism cake... I also can't tell on the oven what the exact temperature is so all of a sudden while doing the dishes and the cake is baking the smell in the air goes from a sweet chocolatey smell to a burnt smell. Yes I burned part of the cake... Just the edges though so I just cut out the good stuff and it was all fine. It also does not explain how to make the glaze. It comes with two packages of chocolate... So I just melted it down with some more apricot jam and kind of poured it on the cake... I think it turned out ok for my first Sachertorte and my first German recipe reading.

We also went out to dinner for Katie's birthday at this Italian restaurant up the street. It was very good. I finished my German homework early so I think I will be lying in my bed and watching True Blood tonight. Relaxing, ahh!

I couldn't find candles at the grocery store so we had to light one big candle, haha.

Oh oh! We just ate the Sachertorte and it was so delicious! I'm so proud of myself!