Gluten-free Chocolate Cake with Rocher-inspired Icing

Moist. Dense yet light. Decadently chocolatey and with the ability to make it gluten-free like ALL of the 180 recipes in The Wholesome Cook book. The icing doubles as a real food nutella, so clever. And the gluten-free chocolate cake? I don’t know anyone who has stopped at having just one piece!

About the cake

One of the favourite blog recipes has been transformed for The Wholesome Cook book. I shared it on stage at the Smooth FM Festival of Chocolate at the Rocks on Saturday 12th September. With tastings that went down a treat.

Now, it’s a gluten-free chocolate cake that’s a little indulgent and as adaptable as it is beautiful to look at and, not to mention, delicious. That’s the whole premise of the book, too. Eat food that’s best for your body. Be flexible when catering for a crowd or entertaining friends with intolerances.

Great, huh?

The cake can be made using wholemeal flour, or teff flour which makes a wonderful version that’s also gluten-free. Best of all it is easy to make and uses just a few pantry staples, plus good quality butter or coconut oil for the dairy-free version. The celebration shot was actually take on the day of Helena’s birthday – she was one of my assistants helping with cooking the book for the shoot.

Use the gluten-free chocolate cake batter to bake donuts!

It is versatile enough to use as a ‘mudcake’ to be covered in frosting for birthday cakes, can be layered with whipped cream and jam, baked in a muffin tin for lunchbox-sized treats or made into 27-or-so baked donuts.

How cute are they?

I have made the cake and these donuts so many times now. Hands down it’s one of my favourite last minute party cakes that turns out no matter the oven. In fact, it is our family’s favourite celebration and cupcake-drive cake.

My go to icing for the cake

I chose to make the Rocher-inspired icing because hazelnuts go so well with chocolate and the broken up wafer (gluten-free waffle cones or buckinis for a gluten-free version) add an interesting crunch to the mix. If you are allergic to nuts you may, of course choose to use just a plain cream-based ganache icing and omit the nuts from the topping.

If you can have them though, the icing makes a wonderful, real food… NUTELLA! Store it in a jar and spread on your choice of bread or rice cakes. Delish.

Serve the cake while still slightly warm in the middle, as the vanilla and cocoa aroma is much more intense then and the cake is even more spongy and soft. Leftover cake can be kept in the fridge for upto 5 days, but I’m sure it will never last that long…

Want the recipe?

There’s an interview on The Alimental Sage website featuring the cake and a bit more about the book, too.

The recipe for this cake and 179 more refined sugar-free recipes, all with gluten-free options and adapatble to other common dietary lifestyles is also in my cookbook.

To make the donuts, use a donut pan and bake for 15 minutes then cool before icing…

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Gluten-free Chocolate Cake with Rocher-Inspired Icing

It's one of my go-to chocolate cakes for birthdays. It's delicious and goes so well with a hazelnut butter chocolate icing! You can also use the batter to make chocolate donuts (use a donut baking pan. Bake for about 15 minutes.

Prep Time20 minutes mins

Cook Time45 minutes mins

Total Time1 hour hr 5 minutes mins

Servings: 12 people

Ingredients

• 1 cup water
• 1/2 cup unrefined demerara sugar or granulated stevia
• 1/2 cup rice malt syrup or honey
• 120 g butter, chopped 100g coconut oil
• 3 tablespoons raw cacao powder
• 3/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 2 teaspoons vanilla powder or natural vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup wholemeal plain flour or teff flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder

For the icing

• 1/2 cup hazelnut butter there’s a recipe for it in the book as well!
• 40 g dark 70% cocoa chocolate or dairy-free chocolate, roughly chopped and melted
• 10 extra hazelnuts chopped
• 1 ice cream waffle cone or gluten-free ice cream cone crushed finely, OR 2 tablespoons buckinis

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 180°C (160°C fan-forced). Grease and line a 22cm spring-form cake tin with baking paper.
• Place water, sugar or stevia, rice malt syrup or honey, butter or coconut oil, cacao powder and bicarbonate of soda in a large saucepan over low heat. Heat, stirring, until butter melts. Increase heat to medium and bring to a simmer – the mixture will rise and double in size. Remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature.
• Once cooled, add vanilla and whisk in eggs. Sift flour and baking powder into a bowl and add to egg mixture, whisking until just combined. Pour batter into prepared tin and bake for 45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Remove from oven, place on a wire rack and allow to cool in the tin.
• To prepare the icing, combine hazelnut butter with melted chocolate and half of the crushed waffle cone or buckinis. Mix well. Scoop the icing onto the cooled cake, spread gently over the top and top with hazelnuts and crushed waffle cone or buckinis before serving.
• Store cake in the fridge, covered, for up to 7 days. You can freeze any remaining slices for up to 1 month.

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