Nutella Brioche Star bread!!!!

So you know that Nutella brioche star bread that was all over the Internet? I've made it already. A million times.

And you want to know something else? 

I made it so many times because everyone loved it so much and now we are taking a 'break' from it!

Maybe a break for one or two weeks then I'm so going to make it again!!! :-P

It is DELICIOUS!!! And it tastes of REAL brioche! Even better than the one you get in the supermarket- because not only is this homemade, but it has Nutella in it.

Nutella makes EVERYTHING taste like its descended from the heavens.

We all know that to be true!

In fact a couple of weeks ago, while I was busy preparing lunch in the kitchen I suddenly heard it.

Heard what?

Nothing! 

You know how scary that is when you have a two year old Snugglebug lurking around the house? Silence is suspicious.

Panicking, I ran out of the kitchen calling his name but had no answer.

Then I saw him in the kitchen- the same room I was in all along- quietly crouched in a corner with his back to me. 

Relieved to have found him I went to give him a hug, only to find his entire hand inside the jar of Nutella that he had pulled out of the 'locked' cupboard. His entire face was covered in the chocolatey goodness and he had a look of pure delight on his face.

I couldn't even be mad at him. I mean we would all dig into the jar of Nutella and eat it all up if we could right?

Needless to say, the Nutella stays in a safer place in the kitchen now.

Anyway. Make this bread. It's super amazing and having some with a nice cup of tea is perfection!!!!

Also, it is SOOO pretty!!!

I got the recipe from here but eliminated the lemon zest. Here's a straightforward video on how to make the bread!

Take each to segments and twist away 360° and then 90°
and press together. 

 

Ingredients

For the dough

• 500 g (16 oz) bread flour or all-purpose flour
• 190 ml (6 fl oz) lukewarm milk
• 3 tbsp sugar
• 60 g (2 oz) melted butter
• 2 eggs
• Grated zest of a lemon
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp dried yeast

The rest of the stuff:

• Nutella
• 1 tbsp milk + 1 tbsp water for a glaze
• Icing sugar

Mix the yeast and the sugar with the milk. Leave for 10 minutes for the yeast to activate.

Beat the eggs in a separate bowl.

Mix the flour and salt in a large bowl. Make a well in the centre and add the butter, eggs and yeast/milk. Mix to a soft dough.

Knead the dough for 10 minutes then form into a ball and place in a bowl. 

Cover and leave it in a warm place until the dough has about doubled in size.

Cut out a circle of baking or greaseproof paper about 30 cm (12″) in diameter. You can use this as a guide on how big to roll out each dough quarter.

Once risen, turn the dough out onto a surface, knock it back knead for 3-4 minutes. Divide the dough into 4 pieces and form each piece into a ball.

Roll a ball of dough out into a circle measuring about 25 cm (10″) in diameter.

Place the dough onto the baking paper on a baking  and spread on a layer of Nutella, leaving a small gap at the edge. Don’t make the layer too thick so that it leaks out!

Roll out a second ball of dough, place it on the first layer and spread with Nutella. Repeat with the third and fourth balls of dough but do NOT spread Nutella on the final layer.

Place something round and circular in the centre of the dough. I usually use my smallest drinking glass.

Cut the brioche into 16 segments. Take a pair of adjacent segment, Lift and twist them away from each other through 180°. Lift and twist through 180° again, then twist through 90° so that the ends are vertical. Press the edges together firmly. Repeat this process for all pairs of segments.

Cover the bread on its baking tray  with lightly oiled cling film and leave in a warm place for 1-2 hours.

Brush with the glaze then bake at 160°C fan oven, 180°C  conventional oven for 20 minutes. 

Let it cool, then you can dust it lightly with icing sugar, but I skip this step because it's too pretty anyway!

This is such an easy recipe with super satisfying results and even the 'dough-making challenged' people such as myself can make it no problem :-)

-S

Nutella and Ferrero Rocher cake

My Snugglebug is two years old!! These have definitely been two of the best and fastest years of my life alhamdulillah :-)

And for his second birthday? All I knew is that the birthday cake had to be epic! 

It's obvious I'm not all that talented in the cake decorating department but the taste had to be something else! After much thought I finally came to a decision! 

Nutella and Ferrero Rocher cake!!!! Now who won't go nuts for that?

I considered adapting my own recipe for it, but with such a short frame of time I had no room for error. I found the most popularly blogged recipe and gave it a shot!

The result?? A decadent, ultra rich, crazily chocolatey and delicious cake that can make you weak at the knees :-D

It was everything that I wanted his second birthday cake to be and it was wiped out super quickly!!

Here's the recipe:

Cake Layers

• 7 large eggs, room temperature
• ½ cups sugar, granulated
• 2 cups finely ground hazelnuts or hazelnut flour
• 3 Tbsp all purpose flour
• 3 Tbsp cocoa powder
• 3 tsp baking powder

Frosting

• 300 grams unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2¼ cups chopped chocolate or chocolate chips
• ½ cup Nutella

• 1.5 cup wafers, crushed

Decorating

• 10 Ferrero Rochers
• ¾ cups hazelnuts, chopped / or ¾ cups wafers, crushed

Instructions:

Cake Layers:

Preheat oven to 350F. Butter 2 – 8 inch round pans and line with greaseproof baking paper.

In a bowl, Sift flour, cocoa & baking powder. Stir in ground nuts.

In a separate bowl, Whip eggs on high speed, until frothy. Slowly add the sugar and continue whipping until tripled in volume, about 5 minutes.

Slowly, mix in the dry ingredients into the eggs.

Divide the batter evenly between the 2 – 8 inch pans and bake at 350F, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Once baked, leave in the pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack.

Although I was super careful not to over bake the cake, I found it slightly dry once it had cooled from the oven. I think the next steps were really helpful in making this cake super moist and yummy.

In a small pan, I made a light sugar syrup using half parts sugar to half parts water. 

Heat 3/4 cup sugar with 3/4 cup water until it comes to a boil. Poke holes using a skewer around both the cake layers and spoon over the sugar syrup equally over the cake and leave for about an hour to absorb.

Make the Frosting:

Melt chocolate in microwave, on low heat, in short intervals, stirring each between each time. Bring to room temperature.

Whip chocolate, butter & Nutella until thoroughly combined.

Assembly:

Once the cakes are cool , you can start assembling it.

Firstly, crush wafers by putting in a ziplock bag, then going over them with a rolling pin or something heavy.

Place a dab of frosting onto a serving platter to secure the cake on to it and then place the first cake layer on it. Generously spread just over a third of the frosting on to the cake and then sprinkle over the crushed wafers.

Place the second cake layer on top of this and spread frosting generously. I also piped some of the frosting around the edge of the cake to neaten it up.

Pipe 8 stars on top of the cake.

Press the crushed wafers or chopped hazelnuts onto the sides of the cake. I used both :-)

Place a Ferrero Rocher on top of each piped star.

Refrigerate the cake but bring it to room temperature completely before serving.  

I got the recipe from here.

This cake was super super yummy and amazing. I do however want to create my own version of a Nutella and Ferrero cake that includes a lot more Nutella. 

Because really, there isn't ever anything like too much Nutella :-P

-S xx