Chocolate Hazelnut Cake
So we end the busy holiday season with my birthday and I am so lucky that Mark is always willing to make me a cake of my choice, well with a few exceptions anyway. He wouldn't make me the the Six Layer Cake with Toasted Marshmallow Filling & Malted Chocolate Frosting, he said since he doesn't like malt that it wouldn't be a food of love thing and therefore wouldn't come out good. Well I can't deny that so it was on to a different choice. I passed on Chocolate Pound Cake with Bacon Bourbon Frosting and a Sparkling Cranberry White Chocolate Cake (maybe in the next few years) and settled on a Chocolate Hazelnut Cake. I adore Hazelnut so this would do well.
I found these recipes just by doing a Google search of best cake recipes and a Huffington post article came up and voila. Life Love & Sugar Blog by Lindsay had this luscious looking Nutella Chocolate Cake recipe that sounded like a must try. http://www.lifeloveandsugar.com/2014/11/12/nutella-chocolate-cake/ Lindsay had so many wonderful looking cakes I'm sure we will be trying several of them out in the future. For not being a professional baker her cakes are gorgeous.
We decided to stick with our favorite chocolate cake recipe of all time Ina Garten's Beatty's Chocolate cake recipe since it uses coffee instead of water. http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/beattys-chocolate-cake-recipe.html
We used Hazelnut coffee in place of regular coffee to give it that little extra Hazelnut flavor though we really couldn't tell a difference. Mark started by making the cakes we chose to stick with just a two layer instead of four layers. We knew we wanted to frost the outside of the cake to help keep it fresh since it would take several days to finish it and we didn't want it to get stale. So our thinking was frosting on the sides would help with freshness and we didn't know if there would be enough frosting for four layers plus the outside. In the future we will do the four layers as there was more then enough frosting.
Beatty's Chocolate Cake recipe
Ingredients
Butter, for greasing the pans
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pans
2 cups sugar
3/4 cups good cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup buttermilk, shaken
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee (we used Hazelnut flavored coffee in this cake)
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter two 8-inch x 2-inch round cake pans. Line with parchment paper, then butter and flour the pans.
Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix on low speed until combined. In another bowl, combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry. With mixer still on low, add the coffee and stir just to combine, scraping the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Pour the batter into the prepared pans and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 30 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack and cool completely.
Place 1 layer, flat side up, on a flat plate or cake pedestal. With a knife or offset spatula, spread the top with frosting. Place the second layer on top, rounded side up, and spread the frosting evenly on the top and sides of the cake.
We then made up Lindsays Nutella Icing Recipe.
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pans
2 cups sugar
3/4 cups good cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup buttermilk, shaken
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee (we used Hazelnut flavored coffee in this cake)
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter two 8-inch x 2-inch round cake pans. Line with parchment paper, then butter and flour the pans.
Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix on low speed until combined. In another bowl, combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry. With mixer still on low, add the coffee and stir just to combine, scraping the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Pour the batter into the prepared pans and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 30 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack and cool completely.
Place 1 layer, flat side up, on a flat plate or cake pedestal. With a knife or offset spatula, spread the top with frosting. Place the second layer on top, rounded side up, and spread the frosting evenly on the top and sides of the cake.
We then made up Lindsays Nutella Icing Recipe.
Nutella Icing
1 cup butter
1/2 cup shortening (we substituted butter for the shortening)
1 cup Nutella hazelnut spread
4-5 cups powdered sugar
3-4 tbsp milk or water
Make icing while cakes cool. Beat together butter and shortening until smooth.
Add Nutella and mix until smooth.
Slowly add 4 cups of powdered sugar and mix until smooth.
Add 2-3 tbsp of milk or water and mix until smooth (we're going to try Hazelnut coffee next time)
Add fifth cup of powdered sugar and mix until smooth.
Add more water or milk until the right consistency.
Butter and Nutella
For only my second piping job it didn't look to bad. We created an edge of piping to hold the Ganache on the top of the cake. Note to self take one of those Wilton decorating classes at Micheals.
Chocolate Ganache
6 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
We doubled this recipe and saved the remainder to use as an ice cream topping.
This was the first time I've used Ganache on a cake but it won't be the last
OH MY Happy Birthday to me
This cake was so delicious, moist and rich we will definitely make it again. I would love even more of a Hazelnut flavor and next time I would apply some crushed Hazelnuts either in between layers on the top or the sides of the cake. Though Mark enjoyed his without ice cream I really needed it to mellow out the richness of this cake.
Bon Appetite
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