THE COFFEEHOUSE CAKE

Vienna’s beloved and beautiful sachertorte is served in cafes all across the city, and even sparked a lengthy legal battle. Words: Summer Rylander

Not one crumb is out of place on Café Sacher’s sachertorte. A slick of smooth apricot jam is sandwiched between two layers of neat chocolate sponge, the whole thing cloaked in a precisely 4mm-thick layer of chocolate glaze before it’s cut into perfectly neat wedges. And it ought to be perfect; this is, after all, a cake so precious to Viennese culinary culture that for years it was at the heart of a legal battle.

Dating back to 1832, the recipe was created when a 16-year-old court kitchen apprentice named Franz Sacher found himself having to create a dessert fit for royalty. Prince Klemens Wenzel von Metternich had requested an impressive finish to a meal for his esteemed guests, and with a poorly head chef, the task fell to young Franz. It’s said that Prince Metternich expressed hope he wouldn’t be ‘disgraced’ by dessert — and he wasn’t. The cake was a hit, and it soon garnered fans beyond the royal court.

Nearly two centuries later, I’m sitting on a red-trimmed banquette at Café Sacher — a quintessentially grand Viennese coffeehouse, within Hotel Sacher. I sip a coffee, taking in the crystal chandeliers, high ceilings and gold accents while I wait for my slice of ‘original sachertorte’ — a name backed by both legend and law. Franz Sacher may have created this dessert, but his son, Eduard, honed the recipe during an apprenticeship at Vienna’s Demel confectionery. After Eduard opened Hotel Sacher in

1876 with sachertorte on the menu, the cake’s popularity soared. Over the decades that followed, however, the question of which establishment — Demel or Hotel Sacher — could lay claim to the ‘original’ version turned into a long, drawn-out legal battle, ending in an out-of-court settlement in 1963.

“It was a good day for Hotel Sacher,” Mattias Winkler, CEO of Sacher Hotels and head of the sachertorte baking facility, tells me. “There are probably millions of different Sacher cakes on this planet, but there’s only one original.” Demel, meanwhile, is permitted to market its version as the ‘Eduard Sacher Torte’.

A precision-cut piece of cake is placed in front of me and I hear a neighbouring diner squeal, “Oh, it’s so good!” as she tucks into her own slice. I pick up my fork and break the silky surface, and for this first bite I forgo

the unsweetened whipped cream that accompanies any classically prepared sachertorte. The sponge is yielding and moist; there’s a subtle note of apricot and a rich chocolate flavour.

With such controversy surrounding it, it seems only fair to try the sachertorte at Demel, too, a short, scenic stroll from Hotel Sacher that takes me past the Spanish Riding School and the 14th-century Augustinian Church. Grey skies haven’t deterred the crowds — there’s a lengthy queue, but my waiting time is blessedly brief, thanks to my willingness to sit outside. Through the windows, I can see the warm glow of Demel’s many globe-like lamps, suspended from ornate ceilings. Sitting inside offers better views of the display cabinets lined with beautifully precise desserts — but for that privilege you have to queue.

Swathed in the scent of sausages and pancakes and sheltered by an awning, I dig into a slice of sachertorte. The sponge is drier, a fact perhaps more noticeable because — unlike the Café Sacher version, which has apricot jam between sponge layers — Demel’s only has a jam below the glaze. The jam itself is also slightly sweeter, offsetting the distinct, but not unpleasant, bitterness of the chocolate.

That’s the thing about this cake. There are countless variations, and which one is ‘best’ is a matter of personal preference — but Café Sacher has to stick to the tried-andtested formula. “The moment we change anything with the recipe, we lose our ability to say we have the original sachertorte,” Mattias tells me. “We may be taking steps to modernise certain things around the hotel, but a few things will not be changed — one of these is the recipe for the cake.”

Not all Viennese bakers are so bound by tradition, however. Sachertorte can be found everywhere, from tiny snack kiosks to centuries-old cafes, and while most take a fairly classic approach, some are pushing boundaries. Gabriele Danek, of Simply Raw Bakery, is among them. Her sachertorte is raw, vegan and gluten-free. “If you run a confectionery in Vienna, the sachertorte is, of course, part of that,” she tells me after I happen upon her small shop on Drahtgasse. “I love to turn traditional recipes into nutritious, plant-based variations.”

There’s a chandelier overhead, but with its patterned floor tiles, greenery and vintage-style furniture, Simply Raw has none of the formality of Demel and Café

Sacher. It’s an environment that suits Gabriele’s modern interpretation of the sachertorte, which begins with a base of walnuts, oat flour and dates, before the necessary apricot jam and chocolate glaze are introduced. The result is visually recognisable as a sachertorte, and contains the familiar flavours, but with a pleasantly chewy texture; it’s wholesome, but doesn’t feel like a wilfully healthy substitute.

As my cafe crawl continues, I wonder if this cake is eaten often by people who actually live in Vienna, or whether it’s more of a ‘thing’ among tourists. “If you live here, you don’t queue in the rain to eat sachertorte, but it’s part of Vienna for sure,” says Caroline Rötzer, an apprentice at Hotel Sacher. “You can taste the history when you eat it — it’s just a special feeling.”

HOW TO DO IT: To travel by rail from London St Pancras, take the Eurostar to Brussels, then a Nightjet sleeper onwards to Vienna. Airlines including Ryanair, Wizz Air and Austrian serve Vienna from various UK airports. Hotel Sacher offers doubles from €500 (£440), room only. sacher.com wien.info/en

From left: Opera House, Kartner Ring, Vienna; Sacher chocolate cake with cream served at Cafe Sacher, Vienna; the terrace of the cafe at Hotel Sacher