Hazelnut and chocolate cake
Having been kept waiting for three hours, Dick Dewy leaves Miss Fancy Day snipping and sewing her blue dress. The plan is that he will return for her a quarter of an hour later, however, Dick convinces himself that he has been scandalously trifled with by Fancy and decides that, to punish her, he will not return. Instead, he leaps over the gate, pushes up the lane for two miles, takes a winding path called Snail-Creep, and crawls through the opening to the hazel grove in Grey’s Wood.
Getting a class of 15-year-olds to relay/read the opening of chapter four of Under the Greenwood Tree, which is memorably entitled “Going Nutting”, is an extremely effective way to engage them with the majesty of Thomas Hardy. And the title is nothing compared to the line (as Dick vanished among the bushes): “Never man nutted as Dick nutted that afternoon.” We were the ones being manipulated, though; our exquisite desk-shaking hysterics feeling like freedom, but in fact keeping us glued to the page and each other. Dick gathered until the sun set and the bunches of nuts could not be distinguished from the leaves which nourished them, at which point he shouldered his bag containing two pecks of the finest produce of the wood.
The nuts, of course, were wild hazelnuts, and nutting (that is, the gathering of them), was one of the joys of the countryside in Hardy’s time. As was the gathering of cobnuts, a cultivated variety of hazelnuts – milky, crunchy and sweet – which can also be used for a game of the same name, played as you would conkers: “The object of which is to crush the nuts of the opponent.”
Cobnuts are still cultivated on Potash Farm in St Mary’s Platt, Roughway Farm in Tonbridge, and Farnell Farm in Rolvenden (to name just a few), selling fresh nuts between late August and the end of October, and available dried from October to December. As well as cobnuts, their torpedo-shaped cousin filberts also grew in the ideal conditions in Kent, and in particular in the golden triangle between Tonbridge, Sevenoaks and Maidstone.
Now, of course, is the time for dried cobnuts and hazelnuts which, having lost their milky sweetness, will have gained a richer, more buttery flavour, coaxed out even more by toasting. Whatever variety you choose, you will need 250g for this week’s recipe, which is a variation of torta caprese, only substituting hazelnuts for almonds.
Heat the oven to 180C (160C fan)/350F/gas 4 and line a 24cm round cake tin with baking paper. Working in a food processor, pulse 250g whole, shelled, toasted hazelnuts or cobnuts until they form a rough flour, then add 200g roughly chopped dark chocolate and pulse again until you have a sandy mixture. In another bowl, beat together 200g room temperature butter and 150g caster sugar until soft and light, then beat in four egg yolks one by one, before stirring in the chocolate and an optional two tablespoons of plain flour. Whisk the four egg whites in a separate bowl until they form stiff peaks, then carefully fold them into the cake batter. Scrape the lot into the prepared tin and bake for 40 minutes, or until the cake is more or less firm but with a tender middle. Don’t worry if the cake sinks at the centre – this is to be expected.
The cake will be delicate when it comes out of the oven, so set it aside to cool in the tin for a while before carefully turning it out on to a rack. A heavy dusting of icing sugar is nice, as is a spoonful of cold cream or – even better – a spoonful of hazelnut ice-cream. And by the way, Fancy does leave her dress and goes off to find Dick. After much talk, all is forgiven and they set about proceeding homewards, quite forgetting the bag of nuts among the brambles.
Hazelnut (or cobnut) and chocolate cake
Makes 1 x 24cm round cake
250g whole, shelled, toasted hazelnuts or cobnuts
200g dark chocolate, roughly chopped
150g room temperature butter
150g caster sugar
4 eggs, separated
2 tbsp plain flour (optional)
Icing sugar, for dusting
Heat the oven to 180C (160C fan)/350F/gas 4 and line a 24cm cake tin with parchment.
Working in food processor, pulse the hazelnuts until they form a rough flour, then add the chopped chocolate and pulse again until you have a sandy mixture.
Beat together the butter and sugar until soft and light, then beat in the egg yolks one by one, before stirring in the chocolate and optional flour.
Whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks, then fold into the mixture. Scrape the lot into the prepared tin and bake for 40 minutes, or until the cake is more or less firm but with a gentle wobble at the centre. It will be delicate, so allow the cake to cool in the tin for a while, before carefully turning out on to a cooling rack and dusting with icing sugar.