It is essential that the butter for your ganache and buttercream are room temperature.

Once you bake your cake on the day of, assembling it takes no time at all. I find it more enjoyable to break it up in parts: The ganache, buttercream, and coffee soak can all be made ahead of time, and both the ganache and coffee soak are fairly straightforward. You just won't be able to get over all those pretty layers! I’ve done my best to make this cake as straightforward as can be, but there’s no getting around it: For a stellar opera cake, you will have to set aside a few hours of your time (perhaps an afternoon) to make it from start to finish. Although there are many components to this cake, it’s a joy to eat and an impressive dessert to make for a special occasion.

The classic French cake is a six-layer masterpiece featuring tender joconde sponge cake, a rich chocolate ganache, and a smooth coffee buttercream. Making an opera cake is not for the faint of heart, so this is not a recipe to make when you only have about 30 minutes to put it together.

Chocolate opera cake