The “wafer torte” (вафельный торт) is a no-bake dessert, and a quintessentially Soviet one (though it, or perhaps its less-evolved antecedent, was invented by an Austrian, supposedly on the basis of the “spa wafers” manufactured in the Czech resort town of Karlovy Vary a.k.a. Carlsbad).
The filling for the wafer torte is a thick, almost fudge-like mass made from boiled sweetened condensed milk (essentially a cheap form of dulce de leche), crushed nuts, and cookie/biscuit crumbs (digestive biscuits are traditional); butter, melted chocolate, and some other variant ingredients are sometimes also added. Layers of this stuff are spread between store-bought wafers, the whole thing is pressed down to spread and absorb thoroughly, and then more dulce de leche is spread on the bare top wafer surface, with a layer of shaved dark chocolate sprinkled on top. Once it’s had a chance to chill and the filling thickens, the torte is sliced, resulting in an almost candy-like dessert that’s shockingly addictive.
Contents
Ingredients
- 8 nine-inch square wafers (see notes)
- ½ c cognac (or whiskey, etc.)
- ½ tsp almond extract
- 1000 g dulce de leche (see notes)
- 227 g (8 oz, 16 tbsp) butter, softened
- 175 g cocoa-flavored tea biscuits or similar dry cookies, crushed (see notes)
- 500–600g mixed nuts, crushed (see notes)
- Glaze (see below)
- 2 oz dark chocolate
Notes on ingredients
The exact number of wafers you end up using depends on the size (you can do 9" rounds, 10" rounds, squares, whatever), so your torte may end up with as few as 4 layers of filling or as many as 8; you should have 10 or so wafers on hand, just in case.
I use this recipe for dulce de leche (with regular milk instead of goat’s, and omitting the cinnamon), quadrupling the recipe (i.e., using half a gallon of milk). The result is almost exactly 1 kg of final product.
You can also use store-bought dulce de leche, though you must watch out for the highly variable quality of commercial versions. If you live in an area where Russian / Eastern European food products are available, you can look for cooked sweetened condensed milk (such as this Ukrainian brand). (Make sure that you’re buying one with just dairy and sugars in it, no vegetable oils or any such thing!) If you use store-bought dulce de leche, you must add vanilla extract (1 tsp) to the filling.
Make sure the biscuits (cookies) you use are fairly dry (the Turkish brand I linked, Ülker, is perfect); they’ll need to absorb the moisture and fat in the filling. (You don’t want to use shortbread cookies, for example!)
The exact composition of the nuts can be varied. I recommend going heavy on walnuts/pecans, but beyond that it’s really up to you. My latest version of the cake took 240 g walnuts, 135 g pecans, 100 g hazelnuts, and 95 g macadamia nuts (total 570 g); note that I didn’t decide on the proportions beforehand or any such thing, I just went to the store and bought likely-looking amounts of each sort of nut. (Why are macadamia nuts so expensive, by the way…?) You could probably add or substitute cashews, peanuts, almonds, or whatever else strikes your fancy.
Instructions
- Prepare dulce de leche, if using homemade. (You must do this step in advance, because it takes a few hours to cook down. Dulce de leche will keep for days, weeks, or even longer if canned properly.)
- Prepare butter. Take the butter out of the refrigerator some hours in advance, so that it can come up to room temperature; the butter must be soft (but not melted!) in order to get incorporated into the filling.
- Prepare wafers. Mix the ½ tsp almond extract with the ½ cup cognac; lightly sprinkle the wafers with the mixture. (Emphasis on “lightly”; you don’t want the wafers to get soggy, you just want them to be a bit less crumbly, and to absorb the flavor and aroma of the extract/spirit. I use a small fine-mist spray bottle for this task.) You don’t need to use all of the liquid, and probably won’t—just use enough to sprinkle/mist all the wafers. Let the wafers dry before using them.
- Crush nuts. I use a food processor for this, which makes this step easy. (Note that you should process each sort of nut separately, because different kinds of nuts take more or less time / pulses to get to the right granularity. Make sure to use the machine’s pulse function, and inspect the contents after each pulse—if you just turn it on and let it run, the nuts will turn into powder, and then butter, before you know it!)
- Crush cookies. You don’t want any big cookie pieces, but don’t crush them into a uniform powder, either. You’ll end up with a mix of ¼" cookie pieces and smaller crumbs.
- Mix filling. In a large bowl, mix the dulce de leche with the softened butter, using a mixer (or with a wooden spoon or whisk, and some patience). Add the crushed nuts and mix well. Fold in the crushed cookies by hand, with a spatula (you don’t want to use a mixer for this part). Let the mixed filling stand for 15–30 minutes.
- Assemble torte. Place one wafer on your cake base, and spread an even layer of filling on it, making sure to get very close to the edges/corners. Place second wafer on top; gently press down to even out the filling. Repeat, adding layers of filling and wafers, until you run out of filling. Place a final wafer on top of the last layer of filling. Even out the sides, pressing any oozed-out filling into gaps.
- Chill torte. Put the torte into the refrigerator for a few hours. You may want to place a cutting board or similar object on top of the torte, to press it down a bit (with a layer of wax paper between to protect the board).
- Prepare glaze. I used a recipe similar to this one on this occasion, but you can use any kind of chocolate or caramel or any other sort of glaze you like. Reserving some dulce de leche (perhaps ½ cup) and using that as a glaze works just fine.
- Grate dark chocolate. I use an ordinary cheese grater for this. Make sure the chocolate is cold before you do this (leave it in the refrigerator for a while beforehand).
- Glaze torte. Spread the glaze on the top and sides of the chilled torte.
- Slice torte. I use a serrated chef’s knife (warmed with hot water and wiped off with a paper towel between slices) to make rhombus-shaped slices (make slices parallel to an edge in one direction, then make a second set of slices along the diagonal).
- Sprinkle with grated chocolate. (If you did this before slicing, you’d make a mess of the grated chocolate when you sliced it!)
