Hazelnuts and chocolate. Chocolate and hazelnuts. Whichever way you want to say it, it's one perfect marriage.
WANT TO SAVE THIS RECIPE?
We'll email this post to you, so you can come back to it later!
The Italians have known this secret for a long time and refer to it as "gianduia". And let's not forget Nutella. That rich, chocolate/hazelnut spread. I have seen people go crazy over Nutella. Prior to living on my own I shared with a number of people who interestingly had this chocolate and hazelnut addiction!
One room mate ate a block of this chocolate mixture a day and the other would wake up in the middle of the night and eat a tablespoon of Nutella in her sleep! I kid you not.
I've tried to pay a little homage today to that famous marriage by baking a buttery cake and topping it with hazelnuts and then smothering it with a chocolate ganache and topping it again with more hazelnuts and a few chocolate curls or "sprinkles". I originally had envisioned a "runnier" ganache but of course I tried to rely on memory and added cold pouring cream to melted chocolate instead of adding warmed cream to the chocolate pieces! Never mind.
The ganache I ended up with allowed me to spread it over the top and was a much thicker consistency.
It's very similar to a chocolate cake recipe I featured last year (minus the olive oil).
What I had envisioned in this perfect marriage of ingredients was the "perfect bite". Hazelnuts-chocolate-hazelnuts without it being too overwhelming.
📖 Recipe
Hazelnut and Chocolate Cake Recipe
Ingredients
For the cake:
- 300 g brown sugar
- 240 g plain flour, all purpose
- 130 g butter, unslated, roughly chopped
- 240 ml cream, thickened
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 200 g hazelnuts, roasted
For the chocolate ganache:
- 200 g dark chocolate, cooking chocolate - 70% min. chopped into small pieces
- 250 ml cream, pouring
Instructions
- Pre heat your oven to 180 deg C and grease and line a 23cm spring form cake tin
- In a food processor combine the sugar, flour and butter. Proceed to pulse the mixture until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
- Spread one third of this mixture into the bottom of the cake tin.
- In a separate bowl whisk together the cream, eggs and baking powder. Fold in the remaining flour mixture and stir until well combined.
- Pour into the cake tin and top with ¾ of the roasted hazelnut mixture
- Bake for 40-50 mins or until a skewer inserted into the middle part of the cake comes out clean.
- Whilst the cake is cooling make the ganache by heating your cream in a heavy based saucepan until it starts to boil. Remove from the heat and pour over the chopped chocolate. Allow to cool a little (or a lot, if you prefer it thicker) and pour over the cake. Top with more hazelnuts.
- Serve with Greek yoghurt.
Nutrition
This website provides approximate nutrition information for convenience and as a courtesy only. Nutrition data is gathered primarily from the USDA Food Composition Database, whenever available, or otherwise other online calculators.
© Souvlaki For the Soul
Leave a Reply