Dark Chocolate & Hazelnut Cake with Toffee Tuile

Chocolate cake again!

The glory of autumn & winter is when I'm craving for chocolate & don't feel guilty of having too much of it.

I baked this dark chocolate & hazelnut cake on a cosy Sunday morning.

This is a true chocolate heaven, very rich & dark chocolatey.

It's very moist & dense, almost like the texture of a brownie.

It's best serving in a small slice with a cup of tea or coffee.

I also made some caramel-dipped hazelnuts & toffee tuile for decoration.

The tuile were simple to make, it's fun to see them melting & bubbling in the oven.

Caramel-dipped hazelnuts were more difficult & I burnt myself with the hot caramel, so be careful.

The end result was a pretty presentation of the chocolate beauty.

Recipe (makes 6):

adapted from Flagrante Delicia

Dark Chocolate & Hazelnut Cake

2 large eggs, separated

60 g icing sugar

100 g dark chocolate 85%

75 g unsalted butter

8 g plain flour

50 g hazelnut, toasted & skinned & powdered

1 tsp rum

pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 180C & line a 6" square loose base pan with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, whip the egg yolks & sugar until light & creamy (approx. 3-4 min).

Add melted chocolate, mix well.

Gently fold in the flour, hazelnuts, rum & melted butter.

In another large bowl, whip up egg whites, fold 1/3 into the chocolate batter.

Fold in the remaining eggs whites & pour into the prepared pan & bake for 15 min.

Remove from oven & let cool on a wired rack.

Caramel-dipped Hazelnuts

60 g sugar

25 hazelnuts, toasted & skinned

Gently insert pointed end of a long wooden skewer into the side of each hazelnut.

In a saucepan, caramelise the sugar.

Dip a skewered hazelnut into the caramel, letting excess to drip back into the pan.

When dripping caramel becomes a thin string, Let stand until caramel string has hardened.

Repeat with remaining hazelnuts.

If caramel hardens before all hazelnuts have been dipped, rewarm it over low heat.

Toffee Tuile

50 g Werther's original caramels

Preheat oven to 180C.

Grind the caramels & spread a thin layer over a parchment paper.

Bake to melt then remove from oven to cool.

Assembling

Cut the chocolate cake into 9 small pieces.

Decorate with candied hazelnuts & toffee tuile.

Enjoy with a cup of coffee or tea.