Dorie Greenspan’s Chocolate and Almond Tabby-Not-Tiger Cake Recipe

Excerpted from ‘Dorie’s Anytime Cakes’ by Dorie Greenspan

Dorie Greenspan,

AARP

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Published October 21, 2025

A photo shows Dorie Greenspan’s Chocolate and Almond Tabby-Not-Tiger Cake

Chocolate and Almond Tabby-Not-Tiger Cake got its name from a mistaken translation.

Nancy Pappas

I’m finally setting the record straight on this cake: it is NOT a tiger cake. Never mind that it’s what I called it from the day I first tasted a version of it in Paris more than twenty years ago. The cake is based on the financier, the famous mini-cake, which was created in Paris in the nineteenth century by a pâtissier whose shop was near the stock exchange.

Every afternoon, the financiers — the stockbrokers — would come in for a snack, and every afternoon they’d eat quickly and take special care not to get crumbs on their cravates. In an act that combined generosity with brilliance and great business sense, Lasne, the pastry chef, created a small cake that could be eaten out of hand in a few bites, neatly and without the risk of telltale crumbs.

He made the cakes as rich as his clients and baked them in small molds that resembled gold ingots. While their origin story may have faded, affection for the cakes has endured — you can find them, or a riff on them, all over France.

But it was the riff that folds chocolate through the cake batter that tripped me up. It’s called tigré and I instantly read — and translated — the word as tiger.

Never mind that I couldn’t find the stripes in the cake; once I got “tiger” in my head, it stuck ... until I was so puzzled that I looked the word up. Oof! I wasn’t so far off — it was just a matter of size. A tigré is a small tabby cat.

The thing I didn’t get wrong was the cake’s deliciousness — this is really one of my favorite cakes. Of course, adding chocolate to make the stripes — or, in this case, the spots — and finishing the cake with chocolate ganache, as I usually do, means that smudges and smears are almost inevitable. Cover those cravates!

Or, if you’re looking for something plainer, simply omit the glaze, and you’ve got a perfect snacking cake.

Chocolate and Almond Tabby-Not-Tiger Cake

Makes 8 servings

Ingredients

For the cake:

5 tablespoons (2½ ounces) unsalted butter, cut into chunks

¾ cup sugar

½ cup all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon fine sea salt

⅔ cup almond flour

6 large egg whites, at room temperature, lightly whisked to break them up

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

5 ounces semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

For the ganache (optional):

⅓ cup heavy cream

1½ teaspoons light corn syrup

3 ounces semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

½ cup sliced almonds, toasted

Directions

To make the cake: Center a rack in the oven and preheat it to 350 degrees F. Butter a 9-inch round cake pan and dust the interior with flour, or coat the pan with baker’s spray. Line the bottom with a circle of parchment paper.

The butter needs to be melted and then added to the batter while it’s still warm, so bring it just to a boil in a small saucepan, or do this in the microwave. You can cook the butter a little longer, until it turns golden brown, if you’d like — browned butter’s flavor is a little toastier and nuttier. Remove from the heat and keep the butter warm while you make the cake batter. (Because I do this on the stovetop, I usually leave the pan on the turned-off burner.)

Working in a large bowl, whisk the sugar, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together until thoroughly blended. Add the almond flour and whisk — if the almond flour is lumpy, use your fingers to break up the clumps. Switch to a flexible spatula and add the whites in three or four additions, stirring until the batter is smooth and flows off the spatula. Stir in the vanilla. Add the butter in three additions, folding and stirring until it is completely incorporated and you’ve got a smooth batter with a light sheen. Finally, stir in the chopped chocolate, blending well. Scrape the batter into the pan and use the spatula to smooth the top.

Bake for 37 to 40 minutes, or until the cake is golden brown, is evenly risen and pulls away from the sides of the pan when gently prodded. A tester inserted into the center of the cake will come out clean. Transfer the pan to a rack and leave for 5 minutes, then run a table knife between the cake and the sides of the pan. Flip the cake over onto the rack, peel away the parchment and invert the cake onto another rack. Let the cake cool to room temperature.

To make the (optional) ganache: Put the cream and corn syrup in a small saucepan and bring just to a boil (or do this in the microwave). Turn off the heat, add the chocolate and stir the mixture gently until blended, thick and shiny.

Pour the ganache over the cake and use an offset spatula or table knife to spread it across the top. I like to cover the top with the ganache and then, if some slides over the edges of the cake, I consider it a win. Scatter over the toasted almonds or arrange them in whatever fanciful pattern pleases you. You can leave the cake on the counter to let the ganache set a bit (it will never be really firm) or refrigerate it for about 15 minutes to set it.

Storing: You can keep the ganache-topped cake, loosely covered, on the counter for up to 2 days (the unglazed cake will keep for about 4 days) or refrigerate it for 3 or 4 days. If you’ve chilled the cake, I think you’ll enjoy it more if you let it warm up a bit before serving. You can also freeze the cake, plain or glazed. If it’s glazed, freeze it unwrapped until firm and then wrap it well. The cake will keep in the freezer for up to 1 month; thaw in the wrapper and, if you’d like, puff a little heat from a hair dryer over the glaze to restore its shine.