Chocolate buckwheat cake

This week i’m sharing with you this delicious chocolate cake that I make all the time for my friends! I thought it needed to finally be shared around so that others can enjoy this. I really really love making it as its so delicious but super simple. I use buckwheat flour when I have it for this cake but you can also just you any other ground up nuts etc (almonds, pecans, hazelnuts, walnuts all work so well!  Because there is no gluten in this cake, the thing that makes it is the egg and sugar mixture which gives it air and holds all the flavours together. It’s a good one to make the day of or a day before! I hope you love it as much as I do!

Chocolate and buckwheat cake

Serves 6-8

Ingredients

200g butter (unsalted)

200g dark chocolate (anywhere between 60% to 80%)

230g sugar (raw or any brown sort of sugar such as muscavado sugar)

5 eggs

130g buckwheat flour

shot of espresso

3 drops of vanilla extract

a pinch of salt

200g crumbled cottage cheese (select a drier and traditional european cottage cheese) this is optional and the cake will bake very nicely also without it!

1-2 tbsp raw cacao

Serving suggestions:

Fresh cup of dark coffee/any lovely fruit jam/sour cream/fresh berries or other fruit

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Prepare a medium sized spring form cake tin by lining the base with baking paper and butter the sides.
2. Prepare a bain-marie…place a small/medium heatproof bowl over a small pot of boiling water. Cut the butter into small chunks and break the chocolate into finer pieces then transfer these both into the bowl. The steam from the boiling water will reach the surface of the bowl and heat both the butter and chocolate. Use a spatula to light mix the butter and chocolate until they completely melt and combine together. Add the espresso, the vanilla extract and the salt. Mix the ingredients through then remove the bowl from the pot and set aside.
3. Place the sugar and the eggs into the bowl of a electrical stand mixer and use a whisk attachment to combine the two ingredients. Whisk on a medium-high speed for approximately 5-7 minutes or until the mixture is light and frothy and has increased in size. Alternatively use electrical hand whisks and a large bowl, do this process if you don’t have a stand mixer (this also works perfectly!).
4. While the eggs and sugar are whisking away, sieve the buckwheat flour into the bowl with the chocolate ingredients. Use a spatula or spoon to mix the buckwheat flour really well through the melted chocolate butter. You might need to do this for a few minutes – until you see there is no more buckwheat flour visible to the eye.
5. Pour the chocolate buckwheat mixture around the edges of the bowl of the whisked eggs and sugar. Use a spatula to fold the chocolate mixture through lightly – until the two are nearly completely combined. This will will take a few minutes. Try not to over fold so that you keep the mixture quite airy. Add the crumbled cottage cheese into the cake mix and fold through 3 times so that it’s all spread through the cake batter.
6. Pour the cake batter into the cake tin and place it directly into the oven. Cook for approximately 30-40 minutes (the timing always varies slightly based on the strength of your oven) and until the top surface of the cake has risen slightly and the cake looks firm in the centre.
7. Remove the cake from the oven and let it cool for 15 minutes on a rack before removing the cake tin and transferring it onto a flat plate or board. The cake will very slightly drop and a few cracks will form. Once it’s completely cool you can sprinkle the surface with cacao and/or serve it with a sour cream/creme fraiche and berries/or jam!

Enjoy!