Happy Black Magic Cake Day

Now, I’m no baker. Usually, I HATE baking and will never volunteer to bake anything unless is to impress a boy or to make biscuits (homemade biscuits will always have a special place in my heart- thanks, Mom [and Betty Crocker]).

Recently, for some strange reason, I had an urge to bake a chocolate cake. I’ve had a rocky history with cake baking- when I was thirteen I decided to bake a chocolate cake from scratch, and misread the ingredients. After adding what was probably 1/4 or 1/3 cups each of baking soda and baking powder, the cake was literally rising up and out of the pan, on it’s way to growing out of the oven. The cake I attempted to bake was the Perfectly Chocolate Cake from my mom's brand new Hershey’s cookbook. After that mess, however, my baking adventures were limited to whatever came out of a box.

So naturally, when I got that urge to bake a cake last weekend, I went back to the Hershey’s repertoire and decided on the Black Magic Cake. It has cocoa and buttermilk and mmmm I knew that would make for a delicious cake. And it did! But, doh… for some stupid reason I neglected to flour my greased baking pans and the cake turned out like this:

Lesson learned! Always flour your greased pans when baking. I knew this. But I obviously had a brain spasm that afternoon. I did happen to salvage the 2^nd cake, so I whipped up a tasty semi-sweet chocolate ganache (semi-sweet chocolate chips, earth balance, vanilla almond milk, cocoa powder, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and a dash of vanilla) to frost it. I brought Jed a piece of the beautiful end result to work that night… It was Valentine’s Day, after all.

Here’s the recipe for the cake:

Ingredients

• 2 cups sugar
• 1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup buttermilk or sour milk* (we used buttermilk)
• 1 cup strong black coffee OR 2 teaspoons powdered instant coffee plus 1 cup boiling water (we used strong black coffee)
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans or one 13x9x2-inch baking pan.

2. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, buttermilk, coffee, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes (Batter will be thin). Pour batter evenly into prepared pans.

3. Bake 30 to 35 minutes for round pans, 35 to 40 minutes for rectangular pan or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely. Frost as desired. Yields 10 to 12 servings.

• To make sour milk: Use 1 tablespoon white vinegar plus milk to equal 1 cup.