I followed that same recipe for the cake part - we had milk and eggs left over from making pancakes so it seemed like an excellent use of them (especially wanted to use up the milk, we never get through milk, even when it is in European size cartons).
Then I spotted nutella in the supermarket (another thing I've always had a soft spot for but couldn't have when being vegan^, and decided to go rogue and nutella-based for the icing. Goodness knows I've had sooo many icing disasters, but still always seem to think I can just chuck stuff in a bowl and make it up as I go along...
DR
Our current apartment has all these mod cons, like microwave and food processor - so I could grind nuts in processor, melt choc in microwave etc. Got to admit it felt quite labour saving!
(makes a rather massive 2 layer, ~8 in round cake)
For the cake:
3/4 cup hazelnuts
1 3/4 cup sugar
2 1/4 cup flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda
good pinch of salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup veg oil
1 heaping tsp coffee granules dissolves in 3/4 cup boiling water
For the icing / decoration:
1/4 cup hazelnuts, plus 3
~25 g butter, softened
~1/4 cup icing sugar
1/2 jar nutella
75 g 70% chocolate, melted
1/2 tsp coffee granules
~2 tbsp plain yoghurt
Heat the oven to 175C / 350F. Grease and line a high-sided 8 in cake tin with removable base*. Grind 3/4 cup hazelnuts in a food processor until quite fine, then transfer into a large mixing bowl. Put the 1/4 cup hazelnuts for the decoration on a baking sheet and toast for about 10 min in the oven as it warms up, then set aside to cool. Add sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, bicarb and salt to the ground hazelnuts and whisk together. In a separate, medium-sized bowl, beat together the eggs, milk and oil. Add this mixture to the dry ingredients and mix until well combined. Add the hot coffee and mix again. It is a pretty runny cake mixture. Pour into the prepared tin and transfer to the oven. Bake for about 60 min (start checking at 45 min)*. It is done when a skewer comes out clean. Take out of the oven and let sit for 10-15 min before turning out onto a cooling rack and leaving until completely cool.
While the cake is baking prepare the icing and decoration. Beat the butter and icing sugar together until smooth, then add the nutella. Add the melted chocolate and coffee, beat some more, add the yoghurt and beat until well combined. At room temperature it is quite soft but it goes hard in the fridge, so you can try and optimise the consistency for when you assemble the cake. Keep it in the fridge while the cake cools. Rub most of the skins off the toasted hazelnuts, then transfer them to the food processor and process just a little, until roughly chopped. Transfer to a bowl and keep until ready to assemble.
To assemble the cake, first trim and even out the top (mine was pretty craggy and high)*. Then cut through the middle parallel to the base to make two layers. Put the bottom layer on a plate, then spread half of the icing onto it (if the icing is too solid you can heat it a little in the microwave but be careful not to overheat). Put the other half of the cake on top and spread the rest of the icing over that. This is enough icing for the middle and top but not to go down the sides - I don't like too much icing and quite like to see the layers. Place the squirrel cutter gently in the middle of the cake and carefully sprinkle the chopped toasted hazelnuts all around it, so that the top of the cake is covered in chopped nuts except for the silhouette of the squirrel. Pack the nuts down around the edges of the cutter then carefully remove the cutter. You should be left with a neat squirrel silhouette. I put an appropriately sized and shaped piece of nut to be his eye, and then arranged three whole hazelnuts as if he might be holding / chasing them.
^Actually, I just noticed the Fotex brand nutella (which tastes just like the real thing to me) is actually vegan. Go Denmark! So it would be dead easy to make this icing vegan. In fact, I think it would be just fine to use straight nutella as the icing...
*Original recipe called for two tins, but I had one so that's what I used. Using two would be preferable as it would significantly reduce baking time (to more like 30 min) and give more even rising.
Actually, the icing worked really well. I wanted the yoghurt and coffee to lighten the nutella and add some sour / bitter. And the chocolate to deepen and richen, and also add some bitterness and thickness. Think it worked. And mmm nutella. It was kind of a conscious decision to cover the top with nuts as I always think chocolate icing can look a bit like poo. But also I just ended up with quite a lot of chopped nuts and felt the need to use them all. I'd kind of intended to just use them to fill in the squirrel shape originally. Or without a squirrel cutter could have made a paper template or just covered the whole top with chopped nuts. S said it's like Ferrero Rocher. This is true, although it hadn't occurred to me until he said it. Perhaps unwrapped Ferrero Rochers would make good decorations if you didn't want to go the squirrel route.
Note: I wanted to make a proper cakey cake this time, but for a flourless style nutella cake this Nigella one looks delicious.
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