1 Year of Blogging: Cinnamon Nutella Cake

Remember when I marked my first week of blogging? 

It has now been a year. My baby blog is a year old! Clearly, this calls for celebration. And true to my blog's namesake, I've got cake.

Ignore the fact that my site already seems full of nutella recipes. You can't ever have too many, right? This cake comes from the BBC's 101 Cakes and Bakes, which was the first proper recipe book of baked goods that I ever got. It's square shaped and about a quarter of the size of your typical cookbook, and its pages are wrinkled and crumpled and yes, a little greasy. Butter stains. But the recipes in it have been some of my go-to's for years. Case in point are my favorite scones.

When I was a kid I started off baking with boxed mixes - cookies, cakes and even pie dough - and for ages in school whenever I was required to bake anything I would still use a box mix because I was terrified of messing up. Ironically it was in between that I would attempt to bake something from scratch that was usually just shared with my family. This was one of the first recipes I tried baking by myself.

I made it once, then for some reason promptly forgot about it. I don't know why because this cake is awesome - embodying the type of recipe that I like to make everyday: comforting, easy, and needs absolutely no excuse. It's essentially a butter cake with crisp edges, a moist crumb and ribbons of nutella throughout. I opted out of baking it with hazelnuts sprinkled on top so that I could spread more nutella on and top it with hazelnuts after for a more celebratory look. Totally worth the extra hours at the gym (who am I kidding?).

Cinnamon Nutella Cake

Adapted from BBC Good Food 101 Cakes and Bakes

Makes one 7- or 8-inch cake

Note: the original recipe calls for an 8-inch cake tin, but I wanted taller sides so I baked it in a 7-inch tin instead and it worked out fine. The original recipe also says to place the nutella in blobs in the cake batter and swirl it around, but I melted it first and drizzled it in - less chance of sinkage that way. Other slight modifications: I reduced the flour and sugar. And as I said before, I baked the cake plain and spread nutella + sprinkled hazelnuts on it after it was baked, but if you want something a little more homey/just don't want to go to the effort (I understand, really) you can just sprinkle the hazelnuts on top of the cake before you put it in the oven. Tastes great either way.

170g butter, softened

150g caster sugar

3 eggs

190g self-raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

2 tsp ground cinnamon

4 tbsp milk

4 tbsp nutella (or any other chocolate hazelnut spread) 

50g hazelnuts, roughly chopped

Extra 3 tbsp nutella (optional for spreading on top)

Preheat the oven to 180C/356F. Grease and line your cake tin.

Place butter, sugar, eggs, flour, baking powder, cinnamon and milk into a bowl. Using an electric mixer, beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.

Measure out the nutella in a small bowl and microwave on high for about 1 minute, or until melty. 

Spread about three quarters of the cake batter into the tin. Drizzle/spoon the nutella over the batter, then dollop the rest of the cake batter on top. With a toothpick or a small spatula, give the mixture a few swirls to create a marble effect. 

If you'd like to bake your cake with hazelnuts, sprinkle them on top at this point. Otherwise, place in the oven and bake for about 1 hour, or until a skewer comes out clean. Cool in the tin for tin minutes before turning out.

Once it's cooled but still warm to the touch, spread on the 3 tbsp of nutella in a thin layer over the surface. Sprinkle with chopped hazelnuts and serve.