This cake has to be the richest chocolate cake I have ever tasted. The recipe is a little complicated, but it’s worth the effort if you enjoy chocolate. I also used this opportunity to practice what I learned recently at a cake design course. My roses didn’t turn out as well as the ones I made in the course, mostly due to the fact that I experimented with using all butter in the coloured frosting, instead of shortening.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup butter
• 1½ cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 cups flour
• ½ cup cocoa
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1½ cups buttermilk  (can be substituted with regular milk and a tbsp of lemon juice)

Directions:

Beat butter with sugar in a large bowl. Beat in eggs and vanilla. In a separate bowl, sift together dry ingredients. Stir into butter mixture alternately with buttermilk (3x dry, 2x buttermilk). Spoon into two greased and floured 9″ pans (1.5 L), filling about ⅔ full. If you have extra, make cupcakes. Bake at 350°F for 30-35 min or until a knife poked into the middle comes out clean. Let cool for at least 20min.

Icing

Ingredients:

• 1½ cups butter
• ½ cup whipping cream
• 1 tbsp vanilla
• 3 cups icing sugar
• 6 oz unsweetened chocolate (3 baker’s squares)

Directions:

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler or microwave for about 1 minute. Beat butter in a bowl until fluffy, and gradually beat in whipping cream, vanilla, and sugar. Add chocolate, and beat until smooth.

Put one layer of cake on a plate and cover the top with icing. Place the second layer on top, and put about 2 cups of icing on top, then smooth it down over the sides, adding more as needed.

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