Chocolate Strawberry Nutella Cake

I am aware that Valentine's Day is over, but I am not over this cake. We had a belated Valentine's celebration at our house last  night, and I whipped up this Chocolate Strawberry Nutella Cake. If you want something easy and impressive, this is for you. I halved the recipe (and am sharing in that quantity) to just make one layer, because I said in the previous post, I am highly unskilled at layering cakes. This suited our family of four just fine, with plenty to spare for my lunch today (yes, really) and dessert for all again tonight. I suppose the only bummer is that you aren't really supposed to assemble it until an hour or less before serving, but I am here to tell you it looks just fine in my fridge today and I think this would be more of an issue if you were stacking layers.

Chocolate Strawberry Nutella Cake

-adapted from pioneerwoman.com (fiddled with amount of sweetening to suit my taste. She way over-sugared the cream and berries, in my humble opinion.)

 FOR THE CAKE:

• 1 stick butter
• 2 heaping T Cocoa Powder
• 1/2 cup Boiling Water
• 1 cup Flour
• 1 cup Sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon Salt
• 1/4 cup Buttermilk
• 1 egg
• 1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1/2 teaspoon Vanilla
• 3/4 cup Nutella

 FOR THE STRAWBERRIES:

• 1 pint Strawberries, Hulled And Sliced
• 2 T Sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon Vanilla

 FOR THE WHIPPED CREAM:

• 1 cup Heavy Cream
• 2 T Powdered Sugar

Preparation Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line 1 round cake pan with parchment, then spray the parchment with baking spray.

In a medium saucepan, melt the butter. Add the cocoa and stir it until smooth. Pour in the boiling water, let the mixture bubble up for 20 seconds or so, then turn it off and set it aside.

In a measuring pitcher or bowl, mix together the buttermilk, baking soda, eggs, and vanilla (just stir it up with a whisk, no need for the mixer). Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, stir together the sugar, flour, and salt. Stir in the hot chocolate mixture, stirring gently until it's halfway combined and less hot (so your eggs don't scramble in the next step). Pour in the buttermilk mixture and continue stirring gently until the batter is all combined.

Pour the batter into the pan and bake it for 17-20 minutes, until just set. This actually took about 23 minutes in my oven. Watch closely. Remove the cake from the pan and set aside to cool completely.

Meanwhile, prepare the strawberries by stirring them with the sugar and the vanilla. Let them macerate (one of my very favorite cooking terms) for 15 minutes at room temperature, then drain off the excess juice. I did this early and just stuck 'em in the fridge. No harm done.

Whip the cream with the powdered sugar. I also did this a few hours early. No harm done again.

To assemble, spread the Nutella all over the surface of the cake. Spread on the whipped cream and top with the strawberries. Keep chilled until serving.