Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Buttercream

I don't eat bacon.

I don't watch The Walking Dead,

I don't support Taylor Swift's transition into Top 40 from country.

I don't own a pair of Uggs.

I do not fit into a lot of standard American cliches.  Whether that makes me a cool hipster rebel or a geeky outcast of society remains to be seen.  My life revolves around working, grad school, keeping my dog happy and spoiled, plus cooking for all of you out there.  Sprinkle in a million responsibilities, deadlines and errands that come with being a so-called "adult", and I'm beat.  I'm too tired to keep up with trends and fads that all twenty-something millennials are expected to know.

That being said, let me tell you about something I do very much enjoy.

Chocolate.

I get that chocolate isn't American, per se.  But there is something undeniably patriotic about diving head first into chocolate that gets me all 'Merica-ed inside.  Maybe it's the way it melts perfectly in a 
summertime campfire s'more.  Or, a steamy cup of hot cocoa in the dead of winter. 

Or, maybe it's the link between chocolate and our nation's obesity epidemic.

No... that does't make me feel as good about chocolate.  Disregard that.

I wanted to create a chocolate cake based off the 1-2-3-4 Cake Premise, and this is the end result.  The addition of coffee into this cake makes the chocolate explode with flavor.  So rich and decadent.  The texture is still the same way I like it - a perfect blend of almost-too-dense-but-still-a-little-fluffy-if-that-makes-any-sense.  

And the buttercream?

Yeah, that doesn't hurt either.

This blows other chocolate cakes and frostings out of the water.

Not that this was a competition with other cakes, but.... I WIN.

'MERICA.














Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Buttercream

1 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup butter, room temperature
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup strong coffee
2 tsp baking powder
2 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
4 eggs

 

 

Chocolate Buttercream:

 

1 1/2 sticks butter, room temperature

2 1/4 cups Confectioner's sugar

3/4 cup cocoa powder

1-3 tbsp heavy cream

Preheat oven 350F.

Combine all ingredients in a stand mixer.  Mix until smooth,

Distribute the batter evenly between 3 greased 9" pans.

Bake for 30 minutes.  Let cool completely.

While the cake is baking, mix ingredients for the buttercream together in a bowl.

Once the cake is cooled, spread buttercream over the top of each layer.  Stack the cake layers on top of each other to form a three-tier cake and cover the sides with the remainder of the buttercream.