I was search around youtube for some ideas on what to bake and then I stubbled upon a ferrero rocher cake. When I made this cake for the first time me and housemates finished it all within an hour! One improvement I would do is to improve the piping of the nutella buttercream swirls on top of the cake.
Ingredients:
Cake:
225g Soften Butter/Baking Spread
225g Caster Sugar
225g Self-raising Flour
75g Ground Hazelnuts
4 x Eggs
1 tsp Vanilla Essence/Paste
1 tsp Baking Powder
Frosting
1 1/2 x Batch of Nutella Buttercream
Decorations:
1/2 x Batch of Dark Chocolate Ganache
100g Peeled and blanched Hazelnuts
8 x Ferrero Rochers
1. Pre heat the oven to 180C/Gas Mark 4. Next line 2 x 20cm cake tins.
2. Place the butter and sugar into a mixing bowl and mix using a stand mixer until the ingredients become lighter and paler in colour.
3.. While the mixture is mixing add the eggs one at time. This will prevent the cake batter from curdling.
4. Add the self-raising flour, baking powder and vanilla essence/paste and mix until everything is mixed in evenly. Then divide the cake batter between the two tins.
6. Bake the cakes for 20 minutes or until golden brown and shrinking away from the sides. Then remove from the oven and leave the cakes to cool on a wire rack.
7. While the cake is cooling make the nutella buttercream and the dark chocolate ganache.
8. When the cakes are cool it is time to start assembling. Place one cake on a serving board, spread around 4-6 tablespoons of the buttercream. Then place the other cake on top to sandwich the two cakes together.
9. Coat the sides of the cake with buttercream by using an offset spatula. This will be first coat of buttercream on the cake. This is the "crumb coat" which will prevent any loose crumbs from appearing on the finally coat of buttercream. Place the cake in the fridge for 30 minutes.
10. While the cake is in the fridge toast the hazelnuts. Let the hazelnuts cool and then place in a food processor or cut by hand into small pieces.
11. Take the cake out of the fridge and add another coat of buttercream. Try to smoothen the sides and the top of the cake. With the left over buttercream pipe eight swirls on top of the cake, making sure there is a gap between each swirl. Place in the for 30 minutes.
12. Once the cake has cooled coat the side of the cake with the hazelnuts. At this point the ganache should have thicken up slightly, but is still pourable.
13. Pour the ganache from the center of the cake. The ganache should flow through the gaps in between each swirl. Then place the ferreero rochers on top of each swirl.