I’ve always wondered what exactly a Devil’s Food Cake was and after reading a few recipes I discovered that it’s really a chocolate cake, with a little coffee in it and then vanilla icing. I must say that I could hardly taste the coffee in this recipe and perhaps it could be made a little stronger, say with 2 or 3 tablespoons of coffee instead of 1. This makes one double layer cake. Oh, I forgot to mention how devilishly delicious this cake is!! Hah hah!
Devil’s Food Cake
Ingredients
Scale
Chocolate Cake
- ½ cup cocoa powder
- 1½ cups cake flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon baking powder
- 100g butter
- 1½ cups granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- ½ cup strong coffee (or water) (I used 1 tbsp instant coffee dissolved in ½ cup)
- ½ cup buttermilk (use milk if you don’t have buttermilk)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Butter Icing
- 150g butter
- 4 cups icing sugar
- 30ml milk
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- White Chocolate Shavings (optional – to decorate)
Instructions
Chocolate Cake
- Preheat the oven to 180° C and grease two round cake tins or even better, cut two rounds out of wax paper and line the pans with that.
- For the cake, cream the butter and the sugar together in an electric mixer until smooth and creamy. (I used my Kitchen Aid on medium for 3-4 minutes.)
- Add the eggs and mix through
- Now add the dry ingredients (which you should sieve as you add them) – the flour, cocoa, salt, baking soda and baking powder, and mix together well.
- Add the coffee and the buttermilk and mix well.
- Divide the cake batter into the two cake tins. I was able to get 2 cups of batter into each round tin.
- Bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.
- Allow the cake to cool completely before icing.
Butter Icing
- Cream the butter in an electric mixer until smooth and creamy.
- Add the icing sugar, milk and vanilla extract and mix together well.
- I piped little dollops around the edge of the cake and then placed chocolate shavings in the centre. Get creative and decorate however you like!
