Gianduja Roulade

That’s just fancy talk for rich hazelnut chocolate ganache rolled into a hazelnut sheet cake rich with chocolate and more hazelnuts.

As you’ve probably noticed, there is a lot of chocolate being eaten in the Purple Foodie household. And this time, with a bag of fresh hazelnuts at hand, I had to put together one of the world’s greatest food pairings: chocolate + hazelnut.

I made the hazelnut ganache from scratch – which means I toasted the hazelnuts, ground it to a paste, and then mixed it with dark chocolate and cream. If the cake didn’t bake in 8 minutes, I’m pretty sure I’d have licked the bowl of ganache clean.

If you’re not particularly inclined on making the ganache from scratch, you could make the ganache with Nutella. Will work just as well.

Gianduja Roulade Recipe

Adapted from: Pure Dessert (USA | UK | India)
Equipment: A 12×16 inch or 11×17 inch baking sheets with rimmed edges, or two 9×9 inch baking pans, or jelly roll pans.

Gianduja Ingredients

100g hazelnuts, toasted
100g dark chocolate
100g icing sugar
200g light cream (I use 25% fat)
Method

Method
Toast the hazelnuts in at 175°C/350°F, until they are fragrant and light brown. Let them cool a little before transferring it to a mixer for grind to a paste starting with half the sugar, and then adding the rest of the sugar until it’s a homogenous paste. Transfer this paste to a bowl and then add the chocolate. In a saucepan, bring the cream to a boil and pour it over the chocolate-hazelnut mixture. Stir till all the chocolate has melted and then refrigerate until ready to do.

Hazelnut Cake Ingredients

50g hazelnuts, toasted
2 tbsp flour
180g dark chocolate
100g butter
4 eggs, seperated
130g caster sugar
cocoa powder, for dusting

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 175°C/350°F.
2. Pulse the nuts with the flour in a food processor until finely ground. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, melt the chocolate and butter over a pot of simmering water. Once melted, remove from heat and then stir in the egg yolks and half the sugar (1/3rd cup).
4. In another bowl whip the egg whites until soft peaks form. Then slowly add the remaining sugar, and beat until stiff peaks form.
5. Fold in about a 1/4th of the whites into the egg mixture. Then scrape all of the egg mixture into the bowl, sprinkle with the flour and hazelnut mixture and fold it in.
6. Spread the batter evenly into prepared pans. I preferred making mine into smaller roulades, so I divided the batter into two 9 inch square pans.
7. Bake for 8-10 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean.Now, finally when the cake has cooled, invert it on a sheet of foil and then spread it with the gianduja paste. Start rolling it with the help of the foil. There will be cracks, but it gets less severe as it thickens to one cake.
8. Refrigerate for a while before slicing, to have neat slices. Dust with cocoa powder to serve.