Even better. Soft, fluffy, moist chocolate cake. Light, mousse-like chocolate buttercream.
YUM YUM YUM.
I made this cake for my best friend's 30th birthday this weekend. I wanted to make something really special but didn't have tons of time.
You may have seen on my Facebook page that I've been making giant cupcakes recently. I was asked to make a giant cupcake as a smash cupcake for a friend's daughter's 1st birthday, so I bought a giant cupcake pan. Apparently you can carve giant cupcakes without a pan, but my skills are not at that level! Giant cupcake pans are not cheap you guys. So since I've bought it I've been trying to get as much use as possible out of it!
The other cool thing is that giant cupcakes look awesome! They are so impressive and very easy once you've worked them out. The cake recipe I'm sharing with you today needs just under two batches to fill the full pan. The two sides don't take the same amount of time to cook, I personally cook them individually.
If you do decide to make a giant cupcake, I cannot recommend enough that you watch Cupcake Jemma's masterclass. I learnt so much from this!
This style of cake is so easy - swirl buttercream all over it and then stick all kinds of different chocolate bars into it! You can even hide any of your frosting errors that way. You want to make sure your cake is nice and soft, and push the chocolate bars right into the cake itself to keep them secure.
Enjoy!!
Chocolate Cake (serves 12-14 people)
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
3/4 cup cocoa powder
2 tsp bi-carb soda
1 tsp salt
2 large eggs
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 cup boiling water
1. Grease the sides of one half of a giant cupcake pan with margarine, or you can use four 20cm cake tins if you want to make a normal cake. If using a giant cupcake pan, flour the pan after you grease it. If using cake pans, line the base with baking paper.
2. Sift all the dry ingredients into the base of your stand mixer. Add eggs, buttermilk and vegetable oil and turn mixer onto low initially, then mix on medium speed until well mixed.
3. Add vanilla to boiling water and add to mixture. Turn mixer onto low initially, then mix on medium until well mixed.
4. Pour into cupcake pan or cake tins and bake at 150 degrees C. If baking in cupcake pan, bake for approximately 1 hour for the base and 50 minutes for the top, or about 25 minutes for the cake tins - or until a skewer or toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean/with crumbs.
5. Remove cakes from the oven and allow to cool in tin for about 15 minutes, then remove cake from pan onto cooling rack to cool completely.
Source: https://www.lifeloveandsugar.com/2014/11/12/nutella-chocolate-cake/
Note: You'll need just under two batches of the recipe to make a giant cupcake. The base takes pretty much the full recipe above; the top cupcake pan takes about 3/4 or a bit more. I mixed up the whole recipe and then made 9 cupcakes with the leftovers.
Chocolate Buttercream
227 grams (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened
3 (1/2) cups icing sugar mixture
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract or 1 teaspoon almond extract (I use vanilla)
4 tablespoons milk or double cream (I use double cream)
1. Cream butter for three minutes in stand mixer.
2. Sift 3 cups of icing sugar mixture and the cocoa powder into a bowl. (Reserve 1/2 cup of icing sugar mixture.)
3. Turn mixer to low speed and add 1-2 tablespoons of the sugar/cocoa mixture at a time, waiting until the mixture is absorbed by the butter before adding the next 1-2 tablespoons.
4. Increase mixer speed to medium and add extract, salt and milk/cream and beat for three minutes. If the frosting needs to be thicker, sift the remaining sugar and add 1-2 tablespoons at a time. If the frosting needs to be softer add more milk/cream.
Source: https://savorysweetlife.com/chocolate-buttercream-frosting/