Chocolate Walnut Layer Cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cut round pieces of parchment paper to fit the bottom of two 8 inch cakek pans.

Melt the 8 ounces of chocolate and the 1/4 pound butter together over hot water. Set aside to cool to room temperature.

Place sugar, eggs, and vanilla in work bowl of a food processor fitted with steel blade or stand mixer with paddle attachment and run until mixture is pale yellow (nearly 10 minutes).

In a large bowl, sift together flour, salt, and baking soda. Mix in ground walnuts. (If grinding walnuts in food processor, add a large spoonful of flour to achieve a fine grind.)

Alternately add buttermilk and cooled chocolate to the dry mixture. Carefully fold in beaten egg mixture just until mixed. Divide batter between the two prepared pans.

Bake for 30 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean. Cool for 15 minutes on a rack, then remove cakes form pans and finish cooling.

Melt the 4 ounces chocolate over hot water as before. cool to room temperature. Whip cream until almost firm. Add vanilla and continue whipping until very firm. Fold in chocolate. (Theoretically, the chocolate should still be very runny when whipped cream in added. However, some of us like it when it has begun to solidify so that there are little shards of chocolate in the shipped cream)

When cake layers are cool and ready to assemble, melt the remaining 3 ounces chocolate over hot water as before. Add butter, stirring until melted, and mixture is a smooth glaze.

Place one cake layer on a serving platter. Top with one half of the shipped cream mixture. Spread evenly across cake and set second layer on top. Pour glaze over top of the cake and spread to the edge of the top layer. Spread the rest of the shipped cream around sides of cake, meeting the glaze where it leaves off. Pat the walnuts into the shipped cream, making a 1 inch ring of walnuts around top edge of cake.

Serves at least 16