Chocolate & Hazelnut Cake

Looking for a quick and easy cake recipe that will knock people’s socks off? Then you have to try this delish chocolate and hazelnut cake – it’s a one-bowl, one-mix wonder.

A triple-layered chocolate cake infused with hazelnut coffee, stacked and iced with whipped milk chocolate buttercream and finished with a halo of crushed toasted hazelnuts. YUM.

While the batter of the cake itself is based on a super simple chocolate cake recipe, I amped up the flavour by replacing the plain coffee used in the mixture with a hazelnut coffee which brought a lightly nutty flavour into the cake.

If you’re not a coffee fan, don’t let the fact it’s used in this recipe scare you off – it’s only there to enhance the chocolate flavour of the cake, you can’t taste coffee in the finished cake at all.

As for the milk chocolate buttercream… well, it’s a dream. How could it not be when you literally beat melted milk chocolate into light, fluffy buttercream?

Finish the cake with a handful or two of crushed toasted hazelnuts to add a bit of interest to the cake and break up the sweetness of the cake with a little nutty flavour. Pop the finished cake on a pretty cake stand like this clever Multifunctional Glass Stand from EziBuy and you’re all set. Enjoy!

Makes one three-layer 6 inch cake

Ingredients

Cake

• 1 cup buttermilk (milk + 1 Tbsp white vinegar)
• 250ml coffee (I used a hazelnut variety), cooled
• 2 cups plain flour
• ½ cup cocoa
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1 ¾ cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• ½ cup oil
• 1 tsp vanilla essence

Buttercream

• 100g butter, softened
• 200g milk chocolate
• 2/12 – 3 cups icing sugar, sifted

Topping

• Hazelnuts, handful

Method

Cake

1. Preheat oven to 180 Degrees Celsius. Grease and line three 6 inch cake tins.
2. Make coffee and set aside to cool. Prepare homemade buttermilk and set aside.
3. Sift dry ingredients together in a large bowl.
4. Add eggs, vanilla, oil, coffee and buttermilk and mix on a low speed until combined. Mix on medium speed for about 1 minute.
5. Pour into prepare cake tins and bake for 20 – 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
6. Leave to cool in tins for 5 minutes then turn out onto wire racks to cool completely before icing.

Buttercream

1. Once completely cool, break chocolate into pieces and melt in microwave in 30 second bursts, mixing between each.
2. Beat together butter and 2 cups icing sugar until smooth. Add melted chocolate and mix until well combined. Add more icing sugar if too runny. Beat until light and fluffy.
3. Stack cake layers together, layering with prepared buttercream. Scoop remaining icing on top of stacked cake and spread until cake is covered.

Topping

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. Place hazelnuts on baking tray and roasted them in the oven for 8 minutes. Remove from oven and place on clean tea towel. Rub lightly to remove loose skins.
3. Place in a snaplock bag and crush with a rolling pin. Scatter nuts across top of cake, pressing lightly into the icing.