In a bowl, slightly whisk egg yolks to break them apart and mix together.
Then slowly whisk in oil and milk respectively until combined.
Sieve in cake flour, salt and hojicha powder. Mix together until well-combined. Set aside.
In another bowl, whisk egg whites until starts to foam, then:
– Add in 1/3 of the sugar and whisk until the foams become condensed.
– Add in another 1/3 of the sugar and whisk until the mixture turns white and lines can easily be formed.
– Add in remaining sugar and whisk until smooth. When you remove the hand mixer, you can see firm peaks.
Preheat oven at 150°C.
Scoop a bit of egg white (meringue) mixture and gently mix with the cake batter until combined.
Then pour the mixture into the remaining meringue mixture and gently fold until batter just combined. Do not over-mixed.
Pour the batter into an 8-inch cake tin.
Lightly drop the cake tin on the countertop 2 – 3 times to knock out any air bubbles.
Bake in preheated oven using top & bottom heating at 150°C for 50 mins.
When done, immediately place the cake tin upside down on the cooling rack and let the cake cool down completely (1 – 1.5 hours).
Once cooled completely, remove the cake from the cake tin and cut into 3 layers.
You may use a long tooth pick or thin spatula to scrape along the side of the cake tin before pushing the cake out of the tin.
In a bowl, whisk whipping cream and sugar together until smooth and just thick enough to hold together.
Add in hojicha powder and mix until well-combined. Do not over mix, if you draw a pattern it should stay on the surface clearly.
Transfer the whipped cream in piping bags.
Assembling the cake:
– Place the bottom layer on the cake stand, pipe a layer of hojicha whipped cream and sprinkle crushed hazelnuts on top.
– Repeat again with after placing the middle layer.
– Place the top layer and spread the whipped cream evenly all over the cake using a cake icing spatula.
– Using a piping nozzle of your choice (we used the open star 1M nozzle), pipe along the rim on top of the cake and around the bottom of the cake.
– Sprinkle a generous amount of crushed hazelnuts in the middle and decorate with some edible flowers.
