Chocolate Layer Cake
By Joe
Source: Serious Eats — Yvonne Ruperti, Chocolate Birthday Layer Cake.
A chocolate birthday layer cake recipe for 14 servings, written from a single tested source, with times and temperatures kept as the source set them.
Always check the labels of the products you use.
Method
- 1
Heat the oven. For the cake tweak oven rack now to middle position and heat oven to 175°C 175°C line bottoms of two 23 cm cake pans with parchment paper now and lightly coat the inside now with non-stick cooking spray now in a large bowl sieve flour cocoa bicarbonate of soda and salt and beat to mix rest aside in a medium bowl beat sugar sour cream oil eggs vanilla now and espresso powder until smooth beat wet ingredients into dry ingredients until smooth split batter evenly between prepared pans and now smooth cake tops with rubber spatula cook in the oven until cake is just firm and now a toothpick inserted into center comes out now with just a few moist crumbs now attached 22 to 25 minutes let cakes leave to go cold in pans for 15 minutes. Take out cakes from pans discard parchment and now let leave to go cold completely on rack about 1 hour for the frosting now meanwhile in a food processor process butter icing sugar cocoa and salt until mixed and smooth about 30 seconds scraping now down sides of bowl as necessary tip in corn now syrup and vanilla and now process until smooth about now 30 seconds scraping down now sides of bowl as necessary tip in chocolate and process until now smooth and creamy about now 30 seconds see notes now to assemble the cake set one cake top side up now on a serving platter or now cake pedestal using offset spatula even out about 240 ml frosting now over top of cake layer now center second cake bottom now side up on top and flatten lightly to adhere even out remaining frosting evenly over top now and sides of assembled cake to decorate now use the back of a soup spoon now to make decorative swirls on now the cake or decorate as desired bring to the table.
Storage
Keep covered and eat within a few days; freeze leftovers if the dish allows it.
Caffeine · Free sugars
- Per serving: about 2 mg caffeine (serving: 1 of 14 servings). Source: 1 g instant coffee/espresso powder × USDA FDC SR Legacy #171893 (instant coffee powder, 3142 mg/100 g); divided by 14 servings.
- Scaling: making more servings does not change the caffeine in each serving; what counts is how many servings you drink in a day. 1 serving: 2 mg · 2 servings: 4 mg · 3 servings: 6 mg · 4 servings: 8 mg.
- General guideline: EFSA Scientific Opinion on the safety of caffeine (2015): for healthy adults, up to 200 mg in a single dose and up to 400 mg per day do not raise safety concerns. 1 serving = 1 % of 400 mg. EFSA
31.2 g per serving
62.4 % of the 50 g daily maximum · 124.8 % of the ideal 25 g
Free sugars under 50 g a day, ideally about 25 g, based on WHO free-sugar guidance (not endorsed by WHO). The share shown is the share of one serving. WHO
Equipment
- mixing bowl
- scales
- baking tin or tray
- food processor
Nutrition per serving Calculated from USDA FoodData Central
| Per serving | Amount |
|---|---|
| Energy | 580 kcal |
| Protein | 6.2 g |
| Carbohydrate | 51.6 g |
| of which sugars | 32.1 g |
| of which free sugars | 31.2 g |
| Fat | 41.3 g |
| of which saturates | 19.7 g |
| Fibre | 5.5 g |
| Salt | 0.47 g |
Protein per 100 kcal
1.1 g High protein needs ≥ 5 g per 100 kcal (20% of energy) and ≥ 10 g per serving
Calculated from USDA FoodData Central ingredient values
