The same thing happened when I tried making the pink lady (strawberry) cake. There is a need for certain things (I went through an egg phase, hamburger phase, chocolate cake phase) that can only be described as a deep aching soul hungerI havent ever been truly starving before, thank goodness, but I imagine pregnant cravings are similarthanks for letting those of us who are past that stage in life live vicariously through you and your delicious soul satisfying recipes! Emily If my notes are correct from the last time I converted it, youll get 12 standard. (Used the metal bowl of my kitchen aid over a double boiler to melt the chocolate, then mixed the frosting in that. but nowall shall be right in the world. I liked your frosting a lot, but the chocolate didnt fully emulsify. Its an okay price, at least. blood orange, almond and ricotta cake. Thank you. And as the cake was baking in the oven, I discovered I did not have any unsweetened chocolate. You have given me inspiration to make this chocolate cake. This is the MOST delicious and eye-pealing chocolate cake I have ever seen. Thanks!! A couple berries and a tuft of whipped cream are optional, but not really."-- @smittenkitchen. Thanks! 1. Whim to bite of cake time was 90 minutes, and during that time I also gave the kids a bath, tucked them into bed, and read some books. I AM MAKING THIS FOR MY BIRTHDAY IN A FEW WEEKS (and maybe before too, purely to test.). I made this (in a Transformer-shaped silicone cake pan) for my sons 6 year old birthday party last weekend. Made this tonight! NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER A BON APPETIT and EPICURIOUS BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR The long-awaited new book from the best-selling and beloved author of The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook and Smitten Kitchen Every Daya collection of essential recipes for meals you'll want to prepare a. Jenny I havent tried it but it might work. This ultra-moist chocolate cake is deep and rich in flavor and best served with whipped cream and toasted hazelnuts. thank you! Thank you for posting! For anyone who, like me, likes their frosting darker chocolate-y and less sweet, I melted an additional 1 oz of unsweetened baking chocolate and added that to the frosting. I think you might mean 185 grams of butter rather than 85g? Wow, have I been missing out! Add one-third of the 1 1/4 cup (155g . I was hoping it would work with the quite sweet yellow cake my husband requested but I was to worried about it to wait and see. I made this while snowed in during the blizzard and Ive been sneaking bites throughout the day, I just cannot stop eating it. ), Its there Add the egg, yolk and vanilla and beat until combined, then the buttermilk and mix again. :). Make sure you use the bake setting, not the broil setting (I did that once when I was a kid!) An exceedingly cute mini-cake! Simply meant to say I dont have Dutch cocoa, so just used standard. However, just a small critique, the instructions re: eggs is very confusing and actually ended up leaving me short. Thanks DEB!!!! Many of the older cakes and almost all in the last couple years are one-bowl or at least each component is. The batter is a touch saltier but I like that in a layer against such a sweet frosting. So you cream the butter & sugar, then add egg and the buttermilk. If so, should I alter the other ingredients? If youre not used to U.S. frostings at all (which, of course, are very sweet), it might seem over-the-top. Id start checking at 15 to be safe. Im glad to know we share the same pregnancy cravings :) makes me not feel so bad about the 24 chocolate cupcakes I just HAD to make last week. No extra dish, too. I sifted the sugar and the butter had softened all day. This icing, which we used for our sons birthday cake, is my favorite. For anyone curious, I cooked them at 15 minutes and it was just about perfect Id do 12-15 minutes for cupcakes to be safe! Recipes. I did have to make the substitution of sour cream thinned with milk for the buttermilk, but it was still a fantastic cake! Ive loved every single Smitten Kitchen recipe Ive tried, and these are no exception. I ordered one for an upcoming birthday party cake, and the instructions say to use a dense cake such as a pound cake. Small cakes? Your suggestion to cut it into 16 pieces was hard to obey, but I did. Its kept quite well in the fridge for a week. There are ways to adjust a recipe accordingly to your neck of the woods. the cake was *very* thin, so i cut it in half and stacked it to create a small layer cake. I this chocolate cake!! Chocolate cake was a frequent visitor to my kitchen in those days. deb says to eat it pretty much right away, and i agree. I made the same cake recipe with their dark chocolate salted pudding buttercream, and it was UNBELIEVABLE. Amazing. I love the size of this cake. can I use just one egg, instead of 1 egg plus 1 egg yolk? It lasted until around 21 weeks with number one, and week 17 with number two. a simple three layered birthday cake? But since I have been paleo for two years now, I find almond-flour baked goods much more fulfilling than wheat flour goods. Are you clicking the print icon below the recipe? Baby is now 3 months. Privacy Policy. Thanks!! I made this cake for Christmas and it was extremely delicious. Your site is consistently the best food site on the entire internet. Are you saying this is not normal? I mean, just look at this cake!! Hello Jen, sometimes I avoid cake recipes like this that require creaming the butter and sugar, because Ive heard that its actually tough to get that step exactly right. Im looking for a new chocolate frosting recipe for my sons traditional birthday cake 33 years of James Beards 1234 cake, made in three layers. But! Made this and it was bone dry and crumbly. As every Italian woman knows, if a pregnant woman does not get the food she craves, the baby is in danger of having a birthmark in the shape of said item. Its funny I wasnt a cake person (blasphemy, I know donuts were my thing) until I got pregnant, and then one day I was like CAKE. Toni Yes, same as the Monkey Cake. The frosting recipe I made as is, with the addition of about 3/4 cup of left-over coconut cream I had. It was still speckled. The only edit I would make is to halve the amount of frosting. If you follow the instructions TO THE LETTER and mix in the drys just until everything is wet, you end up with a thin batter with tiny butter/sugar capsules distributed throughout. Same with frosting. Thank you so much for sharing!!! Its a little stressful to work with because its so soft (I always pop the rounds right into the freezer so theyre easier to lift) but it is always a hit. When I had a piece I cut some cake, scooped out some frosting and let it sitto warm and frosted the squares individually before eating. Is that just me?! that I might have to exclusively dedicate this space for a while to a few currently acceptable categories, those that involve butter, bread, peanut butter or chocolate. I have steadily leaned on SK since I started baking and cooking 15 years ago. I would say it is a great, deeply chocolatey cake. The Double Chocolate Layer Cake is amazing, as is the Peanut Butter Chocolate Cakes cake layers (although I prefer the Double Layer) but this just wins. The Double Chocolate probably is more chocolaty, but I hardly notice. It smells like heaven, and is exactly the kind of evening we needed. Ultimately it was a success! Gah!!! Is the swap 1:1 with buttermilk? I will be making a mid-afternoon trip (through the snow!) :). And now youve posted the cake I have dreamed of. The tart cranberries helped to cut through a bit of the rich chocolate and the frosting was smooth and creamy with just a little bite of ginger. Pinch of fine sea salt (optional) Thank you! I use it so much more often than I ever thought I would. You can make buttermilk by mixing a little white vinegar (somewhere between 1 tsp and 1 Tbsp) and the rest of the cup milk, itll curdle, and then you can use it as buttermilk! Must purchase metal 88 pan ASAP. The frosting is awesome as well! or a combination of stout/buttermilk? Also, I have to say we had a slice last night and my husband remarked that it may even be better the second day. (One bag frozen berries, thawed, cooked in a small saucepan until they make a thick sauce, with a little bit of vanilla and grand marnier, just because). Neutral on the pH scale is 7, not 5. Thanks again! Also subbed 1/2 coffee 1/2 yoghurt for the buttermilk. Reasons for this: the pickled onion recipe should be on my fridge, the sweet tart recipe I use with everything, etc. I noticed Mels comment, but was wondering if you have any ideas about making this frosting without a hand/ stand mixer. Hi Deb! Wouldnt be the same without them! I have one question, can I use gluten free flour? Just looking at these pictures makes me feel the urgency. I made it with wine, and its a big hit (the leftoverssince I made the 913 and served it after a huge meal are being consumed at work now). First published February 26, 2015 on smittenkitchen.com |, Morning Bread Pudding with Salted Caramel, Fried Egg Sandwich with Bacon and Blue Cheese, Strawberries and Cream with Graham Crumbles, http://www.the36thavenue.com/2013/10/birthday-cake-tutorial.html, http://www.highergroundstrading.com/blog/38/coffee-acidity:-the-science-and-the-experience, http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/10/god-of-cake.html, http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/how-chocolate-cake-helped-capture-mexicos-most-wanted-drug-lord/2015/03/02/8a2316fa-c068-11e4-a188-8e4971d37a8d_story.html, https://instagram.com/p/z8VQVBy55B/?modal=true, http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipe/high-altitude-baking.html, http://sweetnessandbite.com/2014/10/how-to-ganache-a-cake/, http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B00Y2QHY02/ref=s9_top_hm_b3rSILn_g79_i13, https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/prevent-dry-dense-cake/. Even my pregnancy-addled, not-right-tin-having self didnt mess it up. Chocolatey. Then I saw an article with the above watch-out. I just tasted one of the chunks (for research, clearly, not as an excuse to have cake for breakfast ;) ) and its sugar!! 5 minutes outside on a winter day, its good to go. Also, I doubled the cake recipe to make a 139 cake but did not double the frosting recipe; it covered it just fine. I wanted to take this to the next level though so I doubled the recipe for 2 layers and then spread a layer of salted caramel in the middle and drizzled some more on top of the frosting. Thank you for always inspiring me! -I used regular cocoa powder and absolutely missed the Dutch cocoa powder, so go for the gold here Bummed. Deb, how is it that you can take the most simple chocolate cake and make it look so amazing that I think that I will just die if I dont go make it right now, even though its nearly 11 p.m.? Deb this is just. You can drop the sugar a little, but too much and it wont be thick enough as a frosting. Im going to stack some to make a birthday cake: Id freeze the cake layer, but not the frosting. Thanks! Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and 3/4 teaspoon salt in large bowl to blend. If anyone is curious to try, here are the measurements I used for the cake (I used a different frosting recipe- whipped ganache): 3 tablespoons / 43 g unsalted butter, room temperature It was good but not knock your socks off good, which has been my experience with everything else Ive made from SK. Its 5:20 am and Im looking at cake recipes. I may have made a few frosting graham sandwiches for myself along the way. Very observant! Do you have Smitten Kitchen Every Day? The dark chocolate color in the cake is great. I had to laugh at your comment about sweet potatoes. This cake was so easy to make and was well loved by all who tried it! I guess I wasnt in the mood for sticky buns last week, or I would have been up on all the news, but I didnt know about the baby! Oops! Mine came out fluffier than I wanted what should I adjust to get it fudgier? As luck would have it, my husbands birthday is tomorrow, so Im using this occasion as my excuse! Youre kind of my hero. Ive been halving bundt cakes for years (very easy to do as all ingredients are easy to cut in half and bake in my junior bundt pan), and Id like this smaller chocolate cake (I halve to halve it :) ) but am at a loss. My daughter is already asking for her birthday to make the SAME! I added a heaping teaspoon of expresso powderDELICIOUS AND EASY. The batter was so good I didnt want to bake it, and the resulting cake is very rich but still so fluffy and light. Finally made this cake for my mother-in-laws birthday last weekend. Thank you for this wonderful recipe it is incredible! Reading this blog right now brings back so many memories. Its a recipe like this that makes me want to brave the snow and go to the grocery store to get the ingredients. 1 cup (125 grams) all-purpose flour I need to make a nice tall chocolate cake for my daughters birthday this weekend. My belly partner is revolted by anything sweet or dessert-y, even though thats what Im craving the most (now that the morning aka 24/7 sickness is gone)! I also recently had a strawberry buttercream that was delicious; I suspect they just took a quick vanilla buttercream and beat in a spoonful or two of strawberry jam. I am so impressed with how tender, moist the crumb is for such a low butter content (I used yoghurt rather than buttermilk) will definitely be making this on repeat! and checking the cooking time. ps Rebecca @ DisplacedHousewife, i didnt see your reply until now (i am excited for the eventual SK revamp that includes replies :)) but i have indeed learned that esp with a gas stove again i can leave the butter there when the stove is off and it gets to room temp perfectly! This is one of my favourite recipes from my mom! Its hot and humid where I live so maybe the weather helped. I know this recipe is going to be fantastic. It traveled well unbaked in the loaf pan, then brought to room temp and baked the next day, it turned out perfectly. The cake never fails and is always a huge hit. Thanks! Well, this looks just perfect. Thanks for posting- I love your recipes, and especially enjoy the baking ones :) I keep running into the same problem with cake baking though, and I wanted to ask for your advice. Came out perfect baked in a 9 inch round. Did in a 9.5 pie pan, which alters the edge texture a bit, but that was what was on hand! I will never go back to regular. I need chocolate cakeNOW!! Do I reduce the confectioners sugar? Sift flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and ground cinnamon over the top, then stir. Love your recipes:) I just moved a few weeks ago from Brooklyn, NY to Germany and I wanted to see if you had any insight on the baking soda/baking powder issue. But why did I have little bits of chocolate in the frosting? someone point me in the right direction! I usually melt half of the chocolate (chopped) and stir in the rest until melted. Thank you! Everyone, Deb is right, get that small offset spatula. I made it and it was so yummy.Everyone loved this delicious peanut butter brownies with chocolate,your cake looks so wonderful, so yummy, and I will be making this again! whole wheat chocolate oat cookies. Your amazing photos have made me want cake. In a large bowl, use a hand or stand mixer to beat the butter and sugars until fluffy; scrape down bowl. This is by far my familys favorite cake! Thanks Deb! Thanks! Can the frosting be made a couple days in advance and refrigerated or is it better the same day? Distilled water would be a 7. I love that it took very few pots/pans to make. I turned this into a dairy-free, stacked birthday cake with the following adjustments: -doubled the recipe Good luck with Elmo! This frosting, tripled, perhaps, looks perfect! Hi, I plan to give this cake a whirl for an upcoming family birthday for 3 chocoholics. I believe its acidic as well, which youll need when using baking soda. They love it and I love that its simple and doesnt leave me with heaps of dishes! Thank you! I wish I could reach in a try a slice! No, sorry, I dont have a tag for it. Mazel Tov on your happy news, and thanks again for your indispensable Smittenkitchen! It may not be important, but Im still wondering: have you adjusted the baking powder since posting this recipe here? Sometimes Im like Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde when it comes to chocolate. Even the first piece of cake, which was shortly after icing it, the frosting was still very soft and the flavor was intensely bitter chocolate. It was, admittedly, FABULOUS, but the speckling isnt ideal for looks of course. will take more time than simply making the frosting right then. . when I suddenly NEEDED brownies, so I feel you on this! The frosting turned out great! At last I have a chocolate cake recipie that tastes of chocolate! Do you think I could add 1/4 cup cocoa powder and decrease the powdered sugar to 1 cup in the frosting? recipes? Two of them (one spare) were slightly bigger than the others, but not that much. I keep Guinness & cocoa powder on hand all the time just in case. boyperson also always complains that our apartment is coldi hadnt noticed until i realized the butter on the counter wasnt soft. Try it again and see if it succeeds this time! I looked at your lighter than air cake, but 4 layers is too intimidating for me Thanks! I could easily see this being a go-to recipe for last minute parties its fast, easy to make, and a definite crowd pleaser. Not too rich. YUM!!! I need to stop reading this blog while pregnant First the cornbread muffins, now the chocolate cake. I made this pretty much as per the recipe (which is quite unlike me, but I had all the correct ingredients) and as a Scot with a love of chocolate, but who finds some American recipes very sweet, I found this was just right. Not to be anal or anything, but to be, umm, anal, I guess: why is everything 3/4th or 2/3rd of the loaf cake but the egg is actually 1.5x? The sweet frosting with this rich second batch hit the right spot. I may turn this into a regular Christmas cake :). Today its the first time Ill make it since I bought your new book and I noticed that there is a difference in the baking powder quantity (1/2 tsp in the recipe above, 3/4 tsp in the book). I love this cake basically my platonic ideal of what chocolate cake should be. If square, 300 to 325%. I love the recipe and will have fun making this with her. I want chocolate cake! I am making a cake this weekend and was planning on doing the golden cake from your cookbook (which always turns out perfectly!) I put little chocolate rainbow sprinkles on it which were very charming and made me happier than I expected they would. Oh my goodness! Thanks Deb!! I guess Ill be investing in a thermometer! Fabulous. Or The Nothing Is Ever Going To Be Okay Again If I Dont Have Chocolate Cake Cake. my friend this cake is gorgeous! I found that the coffee version took slightly longer in my oven, but produced the most delicious moistness. Oh my gosh, this is happening tonight. Thanks for such a beautiful site Deb. I have extra and my kids dont care for pudding so trying to figure out what to do with it. Joining the gym after New Years so this is the week for this cake again. I asked him if we wanted to make the small cake or double it for leftovers and he looked at me like I had 2 heads. Im so surprised. Thank you for the recipe :D. Okay so I made the cake but admittingly havent tried it yet. To the second batch I added guittards 66% chocolate baking chips. We made this (as cupcakes) when we were quarantined for Halloween, and now were making them for Valentines Day and not in quarantine. Hello, Deb. Or just double the frosting? Free shipping for many products! I did add something tho, two tablespoons of Riversdale organic farm orange and cinnamon marmalade to the cake mixture instead of vanilla, but frosting was your recipe. I was worried that it would be dry as most of the cakes that I make from scratch are, but it isnt at all. I cant believe I forgot about it ever, and I gave a lot of catching up to do! Which means that its time for me to actually make it instead of just admiring the photos. Thanks for your response! one note: We only have glass 88 baking dishes, and it required quite a bit more time to bake the cake to done. I am going to purchase a metal 88 as soon as possible! It took about 32 minutes baking time. Im thinking if I work with it while frozen all will be fine.any thoughts? The sugar is a bit much so the salt balances the sweetness a bit and enhances the chocolate flavor. Its held up great over the years. and I was almost out of everything I combined some cream and some milk and a bit if apple cider vinegar since I didnt have buttermilk and it worked great! ANd they way you swirled the chocolate is perfect! Thank you!! Im definitely going to try this recipe! Hi! Rich but perfect cut in 16 squares, and hit the chocolate spot. I made this cake this weekend for a friends birthday. You can also bake it as a lovely loaf. I liked that it was not too sweet so the sweet buttercream was a nice compliment. 2017 on smittenkitchen.com | 2009-2023 . 1 1/2 cups (180 grams) powdered sugar (sifted if lumpy) Man, Deb I have made this cake about 5 times in the last two months. The cake was incredible. I made the frosting and smothered it all over the cake. You can also type CTRL or + P from any recipe post to get to the same print template, or use the Print option in your browser, usually under the File menu. The first two attempts were as the recipe said, the third with replacing 1/2C of buttermilk with coffee. Ive been a lurker heresince I was in highschool? Im salivating on my keyboard here. My mind is blown! Your food aversions made me smile. Chocolatey, soft-textured but not crumbly, sweet but not overpowering. 1 /2 cup / 63 g all-purpose flour If I wanted to make this into a double layered round cake, would you just double the recipe and do in two 9 inch rounds? i got 12 standard size cupcakes plus one bigger one, made in a custard cup. Have never liked chocolate cake (other chocolate things -oooh yeah,) but the color of this one (soooo dark), has me wondering if this will be the one that changes my mind. I definitely agree about the longer (25-35 min) cooking time, and I actually one bowl-ed the frosting somewhat successfully. And maybe use vanilla bean instead of extract? 1 cup (125 grams) all-purpose flour 1/4 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon table or fine sea salt Frosting 2 ounces (55 grams) unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled 1 1/2 cups (180 grams) powdered sugar (sifted if lumpy) 1/2 cup (4 ounces or 115 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature I wanted a thicker cake layer so halved the ingredients from the fudgy sheet layer cake recipe. Thank you for sharing the recipe!!!!!!!!!!!! Susan Im not, although I may not have declared it behind me until 17-18 weeks. From the fridge, its a bit of a pain. I.e. Do let it clabber for 10 to 15 minutes for a thicker texture. had all the ingredients and im one happy MOM! I had to test the recipe and it is incredible! I used cocoa in the frosting instead of chocolate because that is what I had (had to add more milk to compensate) and it turned out to be just what I was hoping for. Thank youit looks so good though! Thanks, Deb!!!!!! My Significant-Something-Or-Other, the theatrical sound-and-lighting tech, had a birthday was this week, but he was buried under two show openings and an over-the-top Sweet Sixteen birthday party (can you believe a $200,000 budget????). Im a good baker, I know how to read a recipe and I use a scale. Bonus: I saved buttermilk last time I bought it by freezing it in ice cube trays 2 tbsp per cube so that made impulse cake making that much easier. Really happy to find a chocolate cake recipe thats not overwhelmed by so much sugar. [kisses]. chocolatey without being overwhelmingly rich (and thus, every excuse for a second slice ;-)). So I added some whole milk until it was smooth enough to spread and then baked it for 25 minutes. The cupcakes stayed moist and were flipping delicious. your salted peanut butter cookies won me a baking competition at work last month, so I thank you for that too :-D I agree. Cool slightly. Special equipment: A pastry bag fitted with a star tip. We had a lot of fun, and the frosting is the best I have ever had in my entire life (she insisted I write that, its all I could repeat after eating it!). I just wanted to correct you because I dont want you to accidentally mess up anything you bake in the future as you would be using way too much butter. I was sick for the first four or five months and couldnt really eat anything that wasnt starch plus dairy (mac and cheese, cheese enchiladas, etc.) I shop there because they have EVERYTHING FOR BAKING but.they arent the most pleasant peeps Ive come across. Has anyone baked it in form of muffins/ cupcakes? I stuck the unfrosted cupcakes in the freezer. I really wanted that light & fluffy frosting. Its what I have always wanted my homemade chocolate frosting to taste like. Two thumbs up. THANK YOU!!! At 11 weeks, mine are fish (every kind except the rare tuna salad sandwich), risotto or risotto-like creations, and chocolate in most forms.