Difficulty: Medium
Prep Time: 20 Mins
Cook Time:
30 Mins
Total Time:
50 Mins
This is my personal favorite cake. I love the nutty, buttery flavor of real cacao (rather than processed cocoa.) This cake is rich, moist, flavorful, and it just. . . . sorry, gotta go make a cake.
Ingredients
- Almond Creme Filling
- Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing
Instructions
- *Preheat oven to 350 degrees. *Grease three 8-inch round cake pans. Line the bottoms with wax paper. Grease on top of paper as well and then sprinkle with flour.
- *Combine cocoa powder and boiling water in a small bowl and mix until smooth.
- *Beat butter, sugar and eggs until fluffy. *Combine flour, soda, and salt in a separate bowl.
- *Add flour mixture alternately with buttermilk to the egg-sugar-butter mixture. *Add cacao/hot water mixture and vanilla extract.
- *Pour batter into prepared pans and bake at 350 degrees until a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean (about 25 minutes.) Cool pans on wire racks for 10 minutes. Remove cakes from pans, placing them on more wax paper to finish cooling. (They will tend to stick to whatever you put them on.) *When the cakes are cool, spread Almond Creme Filling between the layers and layer the cake. Ice the sides and top with chocolate cream cheese icing. (See recipes below.) Decorate the sides and/or top of the cake with slivered almonds and/or dark chocolate shavings.
- *When the cakes are cool, spread Almond Creme Filling between the layers and layer the cake. Ice the sides and top with chocolate cream cheese icing. (See included icing recipes.)
- Decorate the sides and/or top of the cake with slivered almonds and/or dark chocolate shavings. Almond Creme Filling
- *Combine flour and milk in a sauce pan. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly with a small wire whisk to avoid clumping. Remove from heat when the mixture is thick and resembles frosting. (Do not boil or scorch.) Cool completely.
- *Beat butter until creamy; add the cooled flour mixture and beat until smooth. Add almond extract, salt, and sugar, continually beating until smooth and fluffy, like frosting should be! Spread between Chocolate Almond Cake layers. Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing
- *Mix the Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing ingredients in the order given, beating well after each addition. Taste test your icing occasionally as you add the powdered sugar until it is sweet enough for you. Remember: not-too-sweet is better than too-sweet! Ice the sides and top of the Chocolate Almond Cake.