three mistakes.

I made a huge mistake yesterday evening. Well, several, actually. I was supposed to attend my friend's 21st birthday celebration and I had a cake ready to go with only the icing to be made. I ended up working late which really cramped my cake decorating time, then I didn't have enough sugar or milk to make a proper frosting, so I made what should've been a quick run to the grocery and get on with it. Should've been. Minus the part about the massive snow storm that was blowing in and for some reason that sends signals to human minds to overstock on milk and toilet paper. As if you're going to drink three gallons of milk in the one day you can't get out of the driveway. Seriously. Then the frosting scorched on the stovetop not once, but twice, and then I was out of ingredients (again) to give it another shot. By this time, the clock had inched forward far more than I would've liked and my arrival at this party was never to be. Sigh.

This isn't the cake that I made for said birthday party, which should be obvious since this frosting does not look like it was hit by a blowtorch. This was for baby sister's 18th birthday party a few weeks ago and we had a second Thanksgiving-style get together just to celebrate. This is my stand-by birthday cake recipe, a tip I probably should've taken when I decided to try and tackle a buttermilk vanilla cake with white chocolate cream frosting when I was crunched for time. Seriously, why do I do this to myself? This cake is based off the original Hershey's Perfectly Chocolate Cake, but I think my few twists and turns make it even better. I used full fat buttermilk (so many stores are keen on stocking the fat free stuff, but it just won't do) to give it a thicker crumb and a bit of tang on the tongue. Use the best cocoa you can find for this cake since the chocolate flavor is really the hussied up, look-at-me star of the show. Kind of like this girl.

Classic Chocolate Cake

Adapted from the Hershey's Original Cake

For the cake:

2 cups sugar

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour

3/4 cup best cocoa powder

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 eggs

1 cup buttermilk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup boiling water

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Spray two 9 inch round cake pans with cooking spray, line with parchment circles, and spray the parchment.

Stir together the sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Add eggs, buttermilk, oil and canilla; beat on medium speed for two minutes. Stir in the boiling water (batter will be thin, not to worry). Pour batter evenly into prepared pans and bake for 30-35 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Cool in pans about 10 minutes then turn out to wire cooling racks to cool completely. Meanwhile, make the chocolate frosting.

Chocolate Frosting

1 stick unsalted butter, melted

2/3 cup best cocoa powder

3 cups powdered sugar

1/3 cup whole milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine the melted butter and cocoa in the bowl of a stand mixer. Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating on medium speed until it smooth enough to spread, then add vanilla and mix until just combined.

You may need to add additional amounts of milk to reach a good consistency, about a tablespoon at a time.