Influenced by Italian cuisine and modeled on the famous Italian tiramisu, chocotorta is one of the most popular desserts in Argentina. Made with chocolate biscuits, dulce de leche, cream cheese, and chocolate, this treat has found its spot among the best-rated chocolate cakes (currently holds the 3rd position with an average score of 4.4/5). Naturally, Argentinian media services featured these ratings, proud of yet another success of their national cuisine. But not everybody was so enthusiastic, and one man even started a sort of crusade against the beloved dessert.
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That man is Osvaldo Gross, one of the leading figures in Argentinian gastronomy and a chef patissier from Santa Fe, renowned not just in Argentina but internationally for his shows on Utilísima and El Gourmet channels, where he focuses on classic pastry. Among countless accolades, he is the recipient of the "Best Pastry Chef in Latin America" award by the World's 50 Best Organization, granted to him in 2014.
Gross argues that chocotorta shouldn't even be categorized as a cake. In response to the Taste Atlas's ranking, Gross is blunt, suggesting that people's taste buds are deteriorating, emphasizing his distaste for the dessert: "I hate it."
He further elaborates that, in his professional opinion, chocotorta doesn't meet the necessary criteria to be termed a cake. Sarcastically, he says, "You stack some cookies, add three ingredients, and suddenly it's a cake? It's not a cake."
Beyond his criticism of the dessert often found at children's birthday parties in Argentina, Gross doesn't spare the evaluators of Taste Atlas either, stating, "That ranking is made by people who are clueless. They don't know anything, they've never eaten well."
Gross has been a vocal critic of chocotorta for years. He feels that from a culinary teaching perspective, the dessert offers little to impart. Furthermore, in a 2016 interview with LA NACIÓN, he controversially labeled chocotorta as a "showgirl's cake" or "the lazy woman's cake" due to its simple construction. However, he did concede that the dessert is "rich", so... there's still a chance for him to change his mind.
