Chocolate Cake

Chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting

Total time:  1 hour.

Adapted from the Devil’s Food Cake Cockaigne recipe found in the Joy of Cooking. Makes two 9-inch round pans.

5 ounces semisweet chocolate (about a cup!)
2 cups cake flour
1 cup milk, divided in half, room temperature
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
3/4 cup white sugar
3 eggs, separated (means separate the yolks and the egg whites), room temperature
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/4 cup water, room temperature
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla, room temperature
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 350.

In a double boiler, cook and stir chocolate, 1/2 cup milk, brown sugar and 1 egg yolk until smooth and thick. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, sift or mix together baking soda, salt, and flour. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat butter until soft. Add sugar and mix until smooth. Beat in the other two egg yolks one at a time until smooth.

Add about 1/3 of the flour mix to the butter mixture. Mix until smooth. Add the vanilla and water, mix until smooth. Add another 1/3 of the flour mix, mix until smooth (see a pattern here?). Add 1/4 c of milk, mix until smooth. Add the remaining flour mix, mix until smooth. Add the remaining milk, mix until smooth.

Stir in the chocolate mix (until smooth!!).

In a separate bowl, whip two egg whites until stiff but not dry. Fold them lightly into the cake batter.

Bake in greased pans about 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Shown here with cream cheese frosting (3/4 c powdered sugar, 4 T cream cheese, 1 T heavy cream).

I always use semisweet chocolate morsels when I bake cookies, so that’s what I had on hand. The original recipe calls for 2-4 ounces of unsweetened chocolate and an additional 1/4 cup white sugar.

I realized *after* I mixed everything together that I don’t own 9 inch round cake pans… so I used my brownie pans instead.