Chocotorta

Chocotorta is an Argentine sweet made by layering moistened chocolate biscuits with cream and chilling it rather than baking it. The dry biscuits are soaked in liquid and alternated with a soft filling that combines the milky sweetness of dulce de leche with the tang of cream cheese. As it chills, the layers meld into a cake that can be cut into individual slices. Its history also includes a combination made for a family birthday celebration, which advertising for several products then spread across the country.

Time to soak the biscuits and time to set in the refrigerator

The biscuit most often used is Chocolinas, a rectangular chocolate biscuit. The biscuits are dipped in milk, chocolate-flavored milk, coffee or a similar liquid and then laid out. This step softens them enough to be cut and eaten while they keep their shape.

If they soak too long, the biscuits tend to fall apart before they can be layered. If they take up too little liquid, hard layers remain between the soft cream. Because moisture from the surrounding layers continues to soak in gradually after assembly, the texture is determined not only by the soaking time but also by how long the cake rests in the refrigerator. Laying the biscuits in a mold or dish one layer at a time with as few gaps as possible and spreading the cream over each layer gives a rectangular sweet with neat cut surfaces.

A slice of chocotorta showing layers of biscuit and cream. Photo: Nahog, 2020-05-16, location unknown. Original image / CC BY-SA 4.0. Original size, no further edits.

Filling proportions, firmness and finishing the top

Dulce de leche is a sweet made by cooking down milk and sugar. Combined with cream cheese, its rich sweetness takes on tang and a milky flavor. The pairing of biscuits with the bitterness of cocoa and a sweet, smooth filling is at the heart of this sweet.

There is no single ratio for the filling. Some recipes use equal amounts of cream cheese and dulce de leche, while others use more of the latter. Increasing the dulce de leche strengthens the sweetness and the caramel flavor. A firmer pastry-grade dulce de leche is sometimes used, and even at the same ratio, the firmness of the filling varies with the product used.

Finishes for the top also vary. Some leave the final layer of biscuits visible, some spread cream over it, and some cover it with a mixture of warmed cream and chopped chocolate. There are also recipes (ingredient proportions and method) with four layers, but the essential point is not the number of layers itself; it is alternating biscuits with milky cream and chilling the cake so the layers meld.

From a family birthday sweet to advertising for three products

The advertising creative Marité Mabragaña recalls that, for a birthday celebration at home, she soaked Chocolinas and layered them with Mendicrim cream cheese and dulce de leche. She brought the finished sweet to her work at an advertising agency, and linking products from separate manufacturers in a single recipe spread the name chocotorta.

She has said she came up with it around 1982, while a recipe distributed by a company gives 1980 as its year of birth. There are also recollections that similar layered sweets were made at home and in schools before the advertising, and who first thought of this way of layering is uncertain. Advertising that tied Chocolinas, Mendicrim and dulce de leche together under one name spread the homemade sweet throughout the country. She herself prefers to moisten the biscuits with port wine, adding a grown-up aroma that differs from the milk or coffee commonly seen today.

Shunpei Okugawa, who lives in Argentina’s Neuquén Province, describes a home method of layering cookies soaked in milk with cream, chilling it for several hours and eating it with his wife. He sometimes has it the next morning with mate, an example of how the sweet accompanies not only celebrations but also everyday moments of rest.

Coquitorta, made with coconut biscuits

Some versions change the biscuit to create a different flavor. A related sweet called coquitorta uses coconut-flavored biscuits. Some recipes make the filling not with cream cheese but with lightly whipped cream combined with pastry-grade dulce de leche, so that not only the aroma of the biscuits but also the flavor and mouthfeel of the cream between them change. With this method of moistening store-bought biscuits and alternating them with cream, a variety of cakes can be made at home by changing the ingredients.

Glossary