A Cake and a Waltz

“Throw reason and restraint to the wind before you begin,” advised the Swarthmore professor Eugene Weber, when he passed along the recipe of the original Rosenkavalier torte to Craig Claiborne, the American taste-maker supreme and food editor at The New York Times. Whipped up in honor of the beloved Richard Strauss opera, this triple-tier indulgence of mixed nuts, chocolate, and jam was the creation of Mrs. Hugo von Hofmannsthal, wife of the celebrated Rosenkavalier librettist. Her frosting alone called for a pound of butter. She said to slice servings very thin. READ ON