Browsing the archives for the chocolate cake tag.

Witchy Cupakes – 30 Sleeps Till Halloween

Kids

Let the countdown to Halloween begin!!

These little cupcakes are so cute!! I really like to get crafty with kid food, and holiday kid food is my favorite! I used one of my go to chocolate cake recipes. This one is from Robin Hood and I’ve been baking it since 2009 at least. It is one of those wonderfully simple ‘dump all the ingredients in one bowl, mix, pour and be done’ recipe. However, unlike most of those recipes, this one actually comes together with no lumps and it comes out just perfect.

Stir and Bake Chocolate Cake

via Robin Hood

1/2 cup flour
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup warm water
1/3 cup oil
1 tablespoon vinegar

Start with the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Whisk it all together. Then mix in the water. Then mix in the vinegar. Whisk, whisk, whisk and pour into 12 cupcake cups (cups you have previously lined with black or otherwise Halloweeny liners) and bake for about 30 minutes.

To make them witchy you’ll need:
green buttercream icing
decorative chocolate wafer cookies
Hershey kisses
black sprinkles
M & Ms
black shoestring licorice
candy corn

Witchy Cupakes  Witchy Cupakes

First I frosted the cupcakes, then I made their little hats by ‘gluing’ the Hershey kisses to the chocolate wafer cookies with a little dab of buttercream icing. Then I piped orange frosting around it to secure it.

Witchy Cupakes  Witchy Cupakes

Next I added their black sprinkle eyebrows, M&M eyes and their candy corn noses! The personality is all in the eyebrows, amirite?! Some of them look confused but I think the overall effect of grumpy witches worked out.

Witchy Cupakes
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Coca Cola Cake

Domestic, Kids

Something really crazy happened to us this weekend. I mean, it didn’t really come without warning, even though it totally feels like there was no warm up or anything and while it is amazing, wonderful news, it’s also kind of intense.

Yeah, we officially have a teenager now. As in, we are the parents of a teenager.

This sweet little bundle…
Is now this wonderful, official teenager…

There’s a lot that goes along with this happening, but for now I choose to just think about how gone the days are of making birthday cakes for him that fit the theme of whatever he’s into. You know, because what he’s into is Call of Duty and it’s not like I’m going to make an MP5K cake, right? Instead, he now joins the ranks of those of us who are looking for flavor.

Dark cola is pretty much blacklisted in our house. I turn a blind eye at birthdays though, so when I saw the recipe for this I had to make it for him.

Coca Cola Cake

Coca Cola Cake via May Flaum

Cake:
2cups flour
2cups sugar
1/2tsp salt
1tsp baking soda
1/2tsp cinnamon
1 cup butter
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup coca-cola (from bottle is my preference!)
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
1tsp vanilla extract
Glaze:
1/2cup butter
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 cup coca cola

Preheat to 350, spray a 9 x 13″ pan with cooking spray and set aside. Whisk together the flour, sugar, salt, baking soda and cinnamon. In a medium pot, mix up the butter, cocoa, coca cola, and buttermilk. Let that boil.

Coca Cola Cake
Add the boiling mixture to the dry ingredients and whisk, whisk, whisk! Then mix in the eggs and vanilla.

Coca Cola Cake

Pour it into the prepared pan and make the glaze by heating the butter, cocoa and coca cola in a medium pan.
Coca Cola Cake
Now, pour it over the top and try to resist touching it so the glaze has a chance to set up. 20 minutes is enough. 😉

Coca Cola Cake

Coca Cola Cake
Coca Cola Cake
We all ate entirely too much of this, it was that good.

Coca Cola Cake

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Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)

California, Domestic

This is what you make when you want to usher something out of the kitchen that is as hilarious and exciting to serve as it is to eat. Cutting and serving this cake was no joke but since everyone that ate it fell in love with it, I’m filing it as a win. It’s the prefect cake for someone who loves candy and of course works especially well for someone who has a house full of people who also love candy!

Scroll down for pics of the cutting and serving!!

Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)

Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake – via The Kitchen Magpie

3 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, chopped
1 1/2 cups hot brewed coffee
3 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
3 large eggs
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups buttermilk, shaken
3/4 tsp vanilla
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
First, preheat your oven to 300 and melt the chopped chocolate in the hot coffee. Just pour the coffee over the chocolate, and in a separate bowl whisk together sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Theeeeeeen in a smaller bowl (though you’ll probably want to use a bigger bowl than the one I did…), whip the eggs till they’re thick and then combine them with the oil, buttermilk and vanilla. Once that’s mixed well, add it and the melted chocolate to the dry ingredients.
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
The batter was runnier than I had expected, but just roll with it – it’s perfect! I poured it into 3 greased 9″ cake pans and baked for almost an hour.
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Then I made the frosting and dyed it blue – use your favorite frosting recipe, or even *shudder* a can if you must. I used a little between each later, mostly just as glue and for the same reason I slathered it all over the outside so the Kit Kats would stick.
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Line up the Kit Kats around the side of the cake and use the ribbon to pull them tight to the cake, but don’t pull so hard you break them! Make a cute bow at the front and voila! Super cute! Then I covered the top with more frosting and dumped two big bags of Skittles on top!
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
The cake looked so not like a cake that someone stuck their hand in it, thinking it was an elaborate bowl of candy!
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
The blog I first saw this on made no mention of the hilarity that ensues when the cake is eventually cut. The platter I put it on is made of pretty light plastic, so as the Skittles fell from the top of each piece to the platter they made the same plinking noise as the Skittles that hit the floor in the commercials! So so funny. It was messy, but thankfully the hosts are lighthearted and it was all good.
Chocolate Kit Kat Skittles Cake (aka The Willy Wonka Cake)
So obviously this cake looked amazing, but how did it taste? Well, I made this for our new friend Steve’s birthday. I didn’t know anyone at the party other than him and his (amazing & delightful) girlfriend Vanessa. When each guest left and said their goodbyes it went like this ‘Thanks for the invite Vanessa we had fun, happy birthday Steve have a great night, I loved the cake May!’ So ridic, I love it. Someone even loved it enough to draw it’s likeness in chalk on the brick wall in the backyard.
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Pies in Cakes

Domestic

I don’t know if this even qualifies as a recipe, and if I posted step by step pictures of all of it, it’d be a seriously epic post. You may have heard about a bakery in Philadelphia that baked up a two layer cake with two pies in it. Then of course other bakers made it, and most added a third layer. Depending on what cakes and pies used, the name differs. Made from cherry, pumpkin and apple pies, this one is called the Cherpumple. I first saw it on Outrageous Food about a year and a half ago and naturally, I had to make it.

My version is three layers, two medium tiers and one big one. The top tier is an apple pie baked into a vanilla cake, the second tier is a pumpkin pie baked into a spice cake and my personal favorite is a chocolate pecan pie baked into a chocolate cake! So what is that?! Apppumpecan? Or maybe a Pecapumple? I dunno, but it’s like 2000 calories a slice and so good it’s a little frightening.

I trust you can handle the how to of each recipe. If you’re super lazy or really just feel like you can’t do it, go ahead and get some premade pie crust. Just please, don’t use cakes mixes. I’ll know!

Pies in Cakes

This is how I pulled it all together. First, I baked an apple pie, a pumpkin pie and then a larger chocolate pecan pie. As they were all cooling, I made the batter for a vanilla cake, a spice cake and a larger chocolate cake and poured each into their cake pans. Theeeeen, I turned the pies upside down and slammed them into their respective cakes-in-waiting.

Also note these recipes made more than I needed for this project. Extra cake batter was made into cupcakes, pie filling was either made into tarts with extra pie crust or snarffled down from a bowl in the kitchen standing over the sink. What?! Don’t look at me like that!

Vanilla Cake via Martha Stewart
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temp
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
3 large egg yolks
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup low-fat buttermilk
Apple Pie via my Granny
7 cups chopped apples (your pick!)
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 tablespoons butter or margarine
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon water
Spice Cake via The Hungry Mouse
2 cups cake flour
3/4 cups sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon cloves
2 tablespoons ground ginger
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup brown sugar
8 tablespoons butter, room temp
3/4 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
Pumpkin Pie via my Granny
3/4 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 eggs
1 (15 ounce) can pureed pumpkin
1 (12 fluid ounce) can evaporated milk
Chocolate Cake via Me in 2010
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup warm water
1/3 cup canola oil
1 tablespoon vinegar
Chocolate Pecan Pie via Me in 2009
3oz unsweetened chocolate
2 oz butter
4 large eggs
1 cup maple syrup
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons instant espresso powder
1 tablespoon hot water
2 tablespoons Bailey’s (or something like it)
2 cups pecans
Pies in Cakes
Apple Pie waiting it’s turn for the oven!
Pies in Cakes
Chocolate Pecan Pie headed for the oven.
Pies in Cakes
Pies in Cakes
Baked Apple Pie sitting face down in it’s Vanilla Cake batter (left) and the beginnings of the Chocolate Cake (right).
Pies in Cakes
Pies in Cakes
Chocolate Cake batter, ready to be poured (left), and the starting of the Spice Cake batter (right).
Pies in Cakes
Pies in Cakes
Finished Chocolate Pecan Pie baked into the Chocolate Cake (left), innocent looking Vanilla Cake that’s hiding an Apple Pie (right).
Pies in Cakes
Pies in Cakes
The teetering tower of pies in cakes (left), the dowels I decided to stick in the top of the Pumpkin Pie/Spice Cake to make sure the Vanilla/Apple didn’t fall off.
Pies in Cakes
And voila! This took one day and about an hour the following afternoon. I made it for a party about 2 hours from home so I had to finish assembling it there.
Pies in Cakes
Everyone had a favorite layer, mine was defo the Chocolate Cake / Chocolate Pecan Pie. I always add espresso to my pecan pies because I’m a total coffee junkie and that layer is a dessert I would make again on it’s own.
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Love Cakes and Lemon Meringue Pie

Domestic

Both recipes in this post are amazingly fun (and super easy) to pull together. The Love Cakes are pretty standard cocoa cakes and simple to make. I’ve posted a similar recipe before, but this one is a little different and the Lemon Meringue is a recipe I’ve never done before.

All plain chocolate cake in this house is referred to as Love Cake, because my husband’s favourite cake is plain chocolate. Not chocolate fudge, or chocolate chip or chocolate mocha or any variation from straightforward ‘hold the fancy pants’ chocolate cake. He does like a little icing sugar dusted over the top. Much like the rest of his personality his sweet tooth favours the classics.

It can either be be fantastically boring to bake the same cake all the time, or fantastically fun if the recipe is one that you can do over and over with ease. Like this one, called Stir and Bake Chocolate Cake! It’s from the Robin Hood site, they must have a good test kitchen because their recipes always work!

Stir and Bake Chocolate Cake – From Robin Hood

1-1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup warm water
1/3 cup veggie oil
1 tbsp vinegar

Preheat to 350 and grease an 8″ square pan.

 

Whisk flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add water, oil and vinegar and mix till smooth.

Bake for 35-40 minutes. This cake is so moist it really doesn’t need anything – though a little ice cream is always a good thing – and it’s even better the second day!

 

Just as he loves standard issue cakes, my husband LOVES standard issue pies and I really, really love baking pie – any kind of pie really. In no specific order, he loves pumpkin, blueberry, apple, cherry and lemon meringue. Lemon meringue was the very first pie I ever learned to bake in my Grandmother’s kitchen, and as ‘from scratch’ as her kitchen was, she always used Sheriff lemon pie filling. Always. So I never actually learned to make it from scratch! I know, the horror! So I spent years using that same pie filling, and while there is a whole lot of nostalgia around using that filling mix, I just can’t bare to keep using a box. So, enter this recipe.

Lemon Meringue Pie – from Dad 🙂

6 tbsp corn starch
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup + 6 tbsp sugar
2 cups water
3 egg yolks
1 tbsp butter
6 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp grated lemon zest
3 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
1 baked 9″ pie crust

Mix cornstarch, salt, 1 cup sugar and 1/2 cup cold water in a saucepan. Slowly add 1-1/2 cups hot water. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until the mixture comes to a boil and thickens. Boil for about a minute, then add a little hot mixture into the egg yolks. Blend the egg yolks into the sugar mixture.

Cook and stir for another minute, then remove from heat. Add butter, lemon juice, lemon zest and rind. Cool slightly, and pour into your baked pie shell. Set aside and make meringue.

Combine the egg whites and cream of tartar, beat until soft peaks form. Gradually add remaining 6 tbsp sugar, beating until stiff peaks form. Spread it over the filling, and make sure you seal the filling by spreading the meringue right to the crust. Pop it in the oven at 400 for about 5-10 minutes. Watch your meringue people – you don’t want to wreck your beautiful pie on the last step!

Have a great weekend!! I’m very excited about Marriage Monday next week!

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