Quick Chocolate Cake

QUICK CHOCOLATE CAKE

Hooray, cake! Birthday cake, actually. I let my husband pick his birthday cake out of the 250 Classic Cake Recipes book, and since he prefers chocolate, this is what we had. It was tasty, very moist, and we enjoyed it for the week after his birthday.

Quick Chocolate Cake

2 oz grated chocolate

1 C boiling water

½ C shortening

2 C sugar

½ tsp salt

2 C flour

1 ½ tsp baking soda

½ C sour milk

2 eggs, beaten

First, a word on sour milk. When I first read this recipe, I had no idea what they meant! A quick internet search revealed that sour milk in a cake recipe is not, as we may have thought, actual sour milk. If you leave milk out on the counter until it sours on its own, it will be dangerous to consume. In order to make sour milk for cake recipes, mix a ratio of 1 tbsp vinegar or lemon juice with enough milk to make 1 C (ergo, if I need ½ C of sour milk, I use ½ tbsp of lemon juice with enough milk to make ½ C).

Heat chocolate, water and shortening in a saucepan until chocolate is melted and mixture is glossy when beaten slightly. Remove from heat and pour into the mixing bowl. Add remaining ingredients in the order listed. Beat vigorously for 2 minutes. This batter is supposed to be very thin, so don’t add more flour than is called for.

Pour batter into greased pans. Since this recipe is so moist, I would recommend instead of greasing the pans, to use the trick I learned from my mom and grandma: cut a circle of parchment paper to fit into the bottom of the pan. Bake at 350^oF for 30 to 35 minutes.

Like I said, this was an incredibly moist cake with a nice chocolate flavor. I would definitely make this again! I put the Cream Filling from the same recipe book between the 2 cake layers and covered the cake in the Chocolate Cream Frosting.

Have a question or a request? Put it in the comments below and I’ll be sure to respond. Fröhe essen!