Chocolate Fudge Cake
This cake is old school. Family Circle Magazine circa 1975 old school, to be exact. To be born in the seventies makes one a bit of a bad-ass. I know, because I was born in the seventies. Children of the seventies and early eighties didn’t wear helmets. We weren’t in car seats. We played in playgrounds without adults from the age of 4 up. We weren’t given apple slices in our Happy Meal. On weekends and during the summer months, we were frequently locked out of our house. When we’d attend our friend’s birthday parties, which were usually held at McDonalds, our parents weren’t with us. We drank soda. We built forts in the woods using hammers and nails. We played too closely to train tracks. And we never ever wore sunblock. We’d even go from neighbors’ house to neighbors house, begging for food. And sometimes we’d hit the jackpot and get a slice of chocolate fudge cake.
Family Circle’s chocolate fudge cake is exactly what you want in a chocolate cake–moist, dark and rich. Be sure to pour yourself a glass of milk with this one.
I chose this recipe because I wanted to practice making a chocolate fudge frosting. Fudge frosting is prepared a little differently than just a regular American-style buttercream. Here’s how you do it. First you place a medium sized bowl in a larger bowl filled with ice water.
Next, in the medium-sized bowl, mix sifted powdered sugar, milk and vanilla extract together until smooth.
Then you melt butter and unsweetened chocolate together in a saucepan until the mixture becomes smooth and glossy. Add the melted chocolate mixture to the powdered sugar mixture and stir with a wooden spoon.
As you stir, and the mixture is cooled down, the frosting will begin to thicken. Remove the bowl from the iced-water bath when you’ve reached your desired consistency.
Make sure to frost the cakes when they have completely cooled. Also, I’m well aware that children of the sixties, fifties, forties and below are bigger bad-asses then we ever were. After all, they had Dumbo. Have you seen that movie? It’s horrifying.
- 3 oz. (86 g) Unsweetened Chocolate
- 2 1/4 cups (255 g) Cake Flour, sifted
- 2 tsp. Baking Soda
- 1/2 tsp. Salt
- 1/2 cup (1 stick, or 113 g) Unsalted Butter
- 2 1/4 cups (511 g) Brown Sugar, firmly packed
- 3 Large Eggs
- 1 1/2 tsp. Vanilla Extract
- 1 cup (227 g) Sour Cream
- 1 cup Boiling Water or Freshly Brewed Coffee
- 4 oz. (114 g) Unsweetened Chocolate
- 1/2 cup (1 stick or 113 g) Unsalted Butter
- 1 (1-pound or 453 g) package Powdered Sugar, sifted
- 1/2 cup Milk
- 2 tsp. Vanilla Extract
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and line with parchment two 9-inch, round cake pans; set aside.
- Melt chocolate in a small bowl over hot, not boiling, water; cool.
- Sift flour, baking soda, and salt onto wax paper; set aside.
- Using an electric mixer, beat butter until soft. Add brown sugar and eggs; beat at high speed until light and fluffy, 5 minutes. Beat in vanilla and cooled, melted chocolate.
- Stir in dry ingredients alternately with sour cream, beginning and ending with the dry and beating well with a wooden spoon after each addition until batter is smooth. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin).
- Divide batter between pans and bake 35 minutes, until centers spring back when lightly pressed with finger.
- Cool layers in pans on wire racks 10 minutes; loosen around edges with small spatula, turn out onto wire racks, and cool completely.
- Melt chocolate and butter in small heavy saucepan over low heat; set off heat. Beat powdered sugar, milk, and vanilla in medium bowl until smooth. Add chocolate mixture. Set bowl in pan of ice and water and beat with wooden spoon until good spreading consistency, so frosting will hold its shape.
- Put one layer on serving plate, spread with about one-fourth of frosting. Add second layer, then swirl remaining frosting over top and sides of cake.
- Electric mixer
- Two 9-inch round cake pans
- Off-set spatula
- Parchment paper
- Cake stand
