Hazelnut Cake with Chocolate Ganache
This cake is made from Hazelnut flour, and other cake ingredients and is one of the simplest cakes you will ever make that can be so impressive. I topped it with milk chocolate ganache to give it a festive feel.
Servings: 8 servings
Ingredients
- 2 cups Hazelnut flour 7 oz or 200 grams
- 2 tbsp roughly chopped Hazelnuts optional
- 2 sticks of butter room temperature
- ¾ cup loosely packed light muscovado sugar or light brown sugar
- 3 large eggs room temperature
- ½ all-purpose flour
- Pinch of salt
- ¼ tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp Frangelico liqueur optional
- 1 cup semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips I used Guittard 46% semi sweet
- ½ cup Heavy cream or Heavy whipping cream
Instructions
- Pre heat the oven at 350 F. Grease a 9-inch pan lined with parchment paper.
- Using an electric mixer on medium high speed, beat together the butter with sugar, until it looks fluffy and mix looks slightly changed in color. It will take 2-3 minutes. Lightly add one egg at a time, and until each one gets incorporated.
- The batter might look curdled or separated. Don’t worry it will come together. Add in the hazelnut flour, all-purpose flour along with baking powder and salt. Mix everything on low speed until it comes together. Stir in chopped hazelnuts and if using, frangelico as well.
- Transfer the batter in the prepared pan and smooth out the top. Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick or knife comes out clean and the cake looks done. The cake might look darker than other cakes.
- Remove it from the oven, let it cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Take it out on a cooling rack and let it cool completely.
- While the cake is cooling, make ganache.
- In a microwave or stove top, heat up the heavy cream just enough that the chocolate can melt.
- Add the chocolate chips and whisk it well until it melts, and the ganache looks shiny and smooth and there are no lumps in the it.
- Once the cake is completely cool, drizzle ganache on the cake right in the middle (check pics) and going sideways to ensure that the sides are also covered in chocolate ganache. Make sure to put a tray underneath your cake while you pour the ganache to catch all the extra drippings.
Notes
- You can also make your own hazelnut flour by roasting hazelnuts in the pre heated oven at 350 F for 10 minutes, cooling it down for another 10 minutes and then remove the skins by putting them in a dish towel and rubbing it. You can then grind it coarsely. I preferred to buy store-bought hazelnut flour (Bob’s Red Mill) to save time.
- I have reduced sugar considerably, but if you want more sweetness, add about ¼ to ½ cup more. You can find muscovado sugar from lot of places. But If you don’t find it just use light brown sugar.
- Ganache - use best quality of chocolate. I loved how Guittard chips were so silky smooth and made the best ganache. Use all that extra drippings of ganache of extra serving on cake or on ice-cream etc.