Special equipment 21.5cm x 31.5cm brownie tin(s), food mixer (optional), oven thermometer, 2.6-litre hard plastic container with lid (through which you have bored a small hole, using a corkscrew), microwave (if you have one), whipping-cream canister and charges (from www.creamsupplies.co.uk), vacuum-seal storage bag with one-way valve, vacuum cleaner, digital probe, 9cm x 19cm x 5cm-deep baking tin(s), piping bag, melon- baller, large cardboard box, paint gun.
AERATED CHOCOLATE LAYER
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5 Shake the canister, then squirt the chocolate onto the base of the 2.6-litre plastic container. Put on the lid, then place the container in the vacuum storage bag. Position the storage bag’s valve over the hole in the container’s lid. Switch on the vacuum cleaner and place the hose on the valve to suck the air out of the bag. The chocolate should rise and be riddled with small bubbles. As soon as it does so, remove the vacuum and close the valve as quickly as possible. To set the chocolate, place the box — still in the vacuum bag — in the fridge until required.
CHOCOLATE MOUSSE
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8 Fill the base of the paint gun with the melted chocolate mixture and attach the nozzle. To avoid redecorating the kitchen in chocolate brown, set the large cardboard box on its side (which effectively provides a protective roof and walls to work in). Remove the gateau from the freezer. Carefully lift it out of the loaf tin and onto a plate. Remove the clingfilm and place the gateau in the cardboard box. Spray the gateau with the chocolate, turning carefully as you go. Return it to the freezer until 20 minutes before serving.
9 Use a skewer to bore a small hole 2–3in into the centre of the bottom of each indentation, down towards the cherry below. Agitate the skewer a little to increase the hole’s diameter. Pour in cherry syrup until it reaches the top of the bore-hole (but doesn’t spill out into the indentation itself). Place a sour cherry, stalk end up, in each indentation, and sit a dried vanilla pod in each cherry, to make a decorative stalk. For the full effect, fill an atomiser with kirsch and squirt it round the room just before serving the gateau — it will magically bring a little of the Black Forest to the dinner table.