Hazelnut Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Ganache

I’m writing with good news and hazelnut chocolate cake (which means the news is extra good). On Wednesday my mom and I went out for coffee, and while we were waiting and chomping down on a scone, I got a text from our realtor that someone made an offer on our Portland home! And we accepted it!!!! Reader, I can hardly put into words what a huge relief it is to have this process started—hopefully everything goes smoothly and we can officially hand over the keys on November 1st. And wouldn’t you know, when we got the text that an offer came in on our Portland house, we also got a message within minutes that the homestead passed the county inspection, passed the National Scenic Area inspection, and our dwelling permit was approved! When it rains, it pours, as they say. We honestly wouldn’t have gotten here without our amazing builder, Philip of Hainline Construction, so I made this cake as a thank you for him + his team and I’m giving it to him tomorrow at the walkthrough where he’s handing over the keys to the house. SUCH an exciting time!!! (Insert approximately 1,000 smiley emojis here)

And in case you were wondering, this is why no photos of the cake slices exist—it’s not very good cake-gifting-etiquette to slice it before bequeathing it to someone else. But you can rest assured knowing that the inside of the cake is a VERY rich and delectable dark chocolate brown. I actually made this chocolate hazelnut cake for the first time 3 years ago for my friend’s baby shower. She really wanted petit fours so I originally made this recipe into little square cakes, and they were DELICIOUS. Like, hands down the best cake I’ve ever made alongside this one. I wrote up the recipe while I was making it, and there it sat in my drafts for the next 1,067 days. I’m sorry! It’s truly a shame that it took me so long to get this made and shared, but better late than never, I suppose. I made a few adjustments to adapt it to a standard layer cake, and it came out even prettier than the petit fours version, so I’m pretty darn happy with it.

Flavor-wise, let’s get into it! The buttercream frosting has a homemade roasted hazelnut butter incorporated into it, so you get a wonderful nutty hazelnut flavor with every bite. And the cake itself has coffee, cocoa, and hazelnut liqueur in it (I recommend the Frangelico brand), and is probably the most moist cake I’ve ever made. And then you make a little chocolate glaze (which is very easy, you just melt butter in a sauce pan and stir chocolate chips into it until they melt) and drizzle it over the cake. And if you want to be extra fancy, you can pipe some buttercream on top of the cake and then put some of the roast hazelnuts on it.

I hope you enjoy it, reader, and that it gives you a bit of celebratory spirit as it has given me! I don’t know when I’ll be writing again since I’ll be packing and moving the next couple weeks, but when I do I have a feeling it will be about the homestead Read More