260g1 cup + 2 tablespoons Butter, room temperature
⅔cup200g Nutella
170g6oz Dark/milk Chocolate
For the syrup:
½cup100g sugar
½cup120ml water
Also:
40gcrushed wafers
8Ferrero rocher candies
100g3.5oz Chopped hazelnuts
Instructions
DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 350F (175C). Line three – 8 inch (20cm) round pans with parchment paper and grease with butter. 2. Place the hazelnuts in a food processor and process until finely ground. 3. In one bowl sift flour, cocoa powder, baking powder. Stir in the ground hazelnuts. 4. In a large bowl whip eggs on high speed, slowly add sugar and whip until tripled in volume, about 10 minutes. 5. Using a spatula, gently fold the dry ingredients into the eggs in 3 additions. 6. Divide the batter between three pans and bake for 40 minutes. until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. 7. Let cool for 10 minutes in the pans, release from the pan and let cool completely on cooling rack. 8. Make the frosting: in a heatproof bowl, melt the chocolate over a double boiler or in a microwave (in a 30 sec pulses) and let cool to room temperature. Add room temperature butter and Nutella. Whip until fully incorporated and fluffy. 9. Assemble: transfer 5-6 tablespoons of the frosting to a piping bag and keep for later. Place one cake layer on your serving dish, spread a layer of frosting and sprinkle with half of the crushed wafers. Place another layer of cake and repeat the process. Spread the remaining frosting on top and side of the cake. 10. For final decoration: toast the hazelnuts on a pan, crush them and coat the side of the cake. Pipe starts on top of the cake and place 1 Ferrero rocher on each star. 11. Refrigerate for 2 hours before serving. Notes: • I forgot to show it in the video BUT to make the cake more moist, before you spread the frosting over the cake layers brush the cake with some syrup, rum, jam+water or some other liquid. Otherwise your cake will be too dry! • Recipe for a simple syrup to soak the cake: In a medium saucepan combine ½ cup sugar and 1/2 cup water. Bring to a boil, stirring, until sugar has dissolved. Allow to cool. • You can make this cake with only two layers. • If your oven is big enough, you can bake all 3 cake pans together. My over is too small for that. • For the decoration: I chopped the hazelnuts coarsely, But Looking back I think it is better to finely chop them.