As you know, Sarah loves to bake and spends hours reading baking blogs, and browsing over on Pinterest and Food Gawker for inspiration. She has a part time job and wanted to treat herself to a couple of cookbooks to use on the school holidays to master some new techniques. After reading lots of book reviews she purchased Baking by Dorie Greenspan, and Laduree: Sucre The Recipes. We sampled amazing Laduree macarons in Paris so it will be fun to try and recreate them at home.
Baking by Dorie Greenspan is a great resource for baking lovers as it includes over 100 recipes for breakfast sweets, cookies, cakes, pies and tarts, and spoon desserts.
First up, Sarah has baked her version of the Devil’s Food Cake from Baking, using her own frosting recipe.
Chocolate Layer Cake
Ingredients:
1 1/3 cups plain (all purpose) flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
115 g (1 stick) unsalted butter
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
60 g (2 oz) dark chocolate (bittersweet), melted and cooled
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup boiling water
Frosting:
125 g butter (1 stick), softened
3 cups icing (confectioners sugar)
2 – 4 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon cocoa
50 g dark chocolate, melted
sprinkles
Method:
Preheat oven to 175 deg C (350 deg F). Grease two 8 inch round cake tins, Line the base with baking paper.
Sift together flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Using a stand mixer, beat the butter on medium speed until soft and creamy. Add the sugars and beat well for 3 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time. Beat in vanilla. Reduce speed and mix in melted chocolate. Add the dry ingredients alternately with the milk in three additions. Using a low speed, beat int he boiling water. Divide the batter evenly between the two pans.
Bake for 25 – 30 minutes, rotating the pans at the midway point. Transfer cakes to a wire rack to cool. Invert cakes on wire rack and allow to cool completely.
Place the butter in a large mixing bowl and on medium speed of an electric mixer beat until smooth. Add the sugar, 2 tablespoons of milk, vanilla, melted chocolate and cocoa. Beat until smooth and creamy, about 5-7 minutes. Gradually add the remaining milk or until the icing is thick enough to be of good spreading consistency.
Sandwich cakes together with frosting. Spread frosting on top and sides of cake. Decorate with sprinkles.Refrigerate cake for an hour before serving.
The chocolate layer cake was as delicious as it looks! Moist and chocolatey – just what you want in a cake. We can’t wait for Sarah to try some other recipes from her new baking titles.
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hmmm, this sounds really tasty.
ANNi♥
Oh this looks delicious! I can always use a good chocolate cake recipe. Thanks so much!
Looks delicious. Do you have a recipe for a moist homemade white cake. The one I have is not moist.
I love ‘Baking’ too – it is a fabulous book, and very addictive! I highly recommend the peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chipsters 🙂