We make fun of weird holidays like National Kumquat Day, but we’re genuinely enlightened by National Hazelnut Cake Day–that being tomorrow, June 1st. We’ve never made Hazelnut Cake. We’ve never even thought about Hazelnut Cake. But, as it turns out, Hazelnut Cakes are pretty popular around the world. The most popular versions are European versions of the cake. That makes sense, considering that Turkey produces 75% of the world’s hazelnut crop. [photo via food.com]
Italy’s Pampepato cake, France’s Dacquoise cake, and the Ukraine’s Kiev cake features hazelnut as a primary ingredient. We’ve found some pretty elaborate recipes featuring chocolate, fruits, honey, and/or coffe–but the kids really liked this German Hazelnut Cake recipe. It took a special trip to the grocery store, but it’s a lot easier than you’d expect…
Ingredients
- 9 oz butter or margarine
- 1 C sugar
- 4 eggs
- 2 drops bitter almond essence or vanilla extract
- 2 ¼ C all-purpose flour
- 3 tsp baking powder
- 1 ¼ C ground hazelnuts
- 1 ¾ oz Swiss or semi-sweet chocolate, finely chopped
- Icing sugar (for dusting)
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350oF.
- Mix together the sugar, eggs and flavoring and set aside.
- In another bowl, cream the butter and gradually add it to the sugar mixture.
- Mix the flour, baking powder and ground nuts together.
- Add it to the sugar and butter mixture a spoonful at a time.
- Fold in the chocolate.
- Grease a 10 ½” ring baking tin and fill with the batter.
- Bake in preheated oven for 50 to 65 minutes.
- Test cake for doneness by piercing the middle with a wooden toothpick; if it’s clean it is done.
- Remove from oven and allow to stand for 5 to 10 minutes, loosen from sides of tin with knife then turn out onto a cake wire so that it can dry off.
- Dust the cooled cake with icing sugar.
This cake doesn’t take much time to prepare, and only takes an hour to bake. This recipe makes one 10 ½” cake that serves…um, 10 people. You might want to invite a few friends over to help finish the cake off. But don’t feel too guilty about having a slice or two. Hazelnuts contain lots of protein, vitamins, and antioxidants!
