Tinkering with a perfect, simple classic: the Perfectly Chocolate Cake

A perfectly simple (really simple) classic chocolate cake gets more interesting with cayenne pepper, cinnamon and buttermilk. Recipe below.

YESTERDAY WAS MY BIRTHDAY AND TODAY I AM EATING A PIECE OF CAKE while I write about cake. Originally I intended to get fancy and order a cake—to have it delivered or pick it up somewhere. But in the interest of self-preservation, we are still not going into shops, and as I hunted around here in Chicago, I found that pretty much nobody offered contactless curbside pickup of cakes (and I can’t blame them, what with Christmas and all). And the delivery options scared the pants off me. $200 for a cake? For two people? EEEEEEEEEEEE Naw.

Which is how I ended up deciding to bake. And, since Terry and I are taking time off this week, I wanted the Lazy Marion option—something that felt festive, but that I could knock together pretty easily.

Enter one of the American classics: the Hershey’s Perfectly Chocolate Cake. This recipe has been around forever (in fact, I suspect my mother used to make it).

If you like chocolate cake, and you are not a confident baker, you should learn this cake. It’s remarkably fast and easy, it delivers great big chocolate flavor, you can tailor it a bit if you like (I offer one super-simple option farther down), and yes, you can freeze it by the slice so Future You can have some treats.

Also, it requires no special pastry equipment—no pastry bags, no tips, no levelers or nozzles or turntable. It’s all stuff you probably already own, plus improv for what you don’t. Many people have been tinkering with this foundation for decades. Here are my tinkerings.

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Marion’s Perfectly Chocolate Cake

A perfectly simple (really simple) classic chocolate cake gets more interesting with cayenne pepper, cinnamon and buttermilk.

Course Dessert

Servings 12 slices

Equipment

• hand mixer, two 9-inch cake pans (or see kitchen notes), cooling racks

Ingredients

For the batter

• 1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 cups white sugar
• 1-3/4 cups unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional—See Kitchen Notes)
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup buttermilk (see Kitchen notes)
• 1/2 cup plant butter, melted (see Kitchen Notes)
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup boiling water

For the frosting

• 1/2 cup plant butter melted
• 2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 3 cups powdered sugar (see Kitchen notes)
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne (optional)

Instructions

• First, make the cake layers. Prepare the cake pans: oil them well, dust lightly with flour, then cover the bottom of each with a circle of parchment paper and oil that. (If you are using a different size of pan, prepare it similarly; if you are using cupcake tins, just line with paper cups. See Kitchen Notes for different sizes of pans.)
• Heat the oven to 350ºF. Position the racks in the center.
• Spoon the flour into a large mixing bowl, then lightly add in the cocoas powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cayenne pepper, if using. Stir everything with a fork.
• In a medium bowl, crack the eggs, whisk them quickly, then add in the buttermilk and vanilla and then the melted plant butter, mixing at each step. Add all of this to the dry ingredients. Mix everything at medium speed with your electric hand mixer—90 seconds to 2 minutes—you want everything to be uniform and non-lumpy. Then pour in the boiling water and mix it into the batter with the mixer, at low speed, or just with a whisk. The batter will be very thin.
• Divide the batter between the two prepared cake pans—I used a half-cup measure to dole things out evenly. Put the pans in the oven—one per rack. In about 15 minutes, gently open the oven door and switch each to the other rack, also rotating them a half turn. In another 10 (or so) minutes, test them—a tester inserted at the center should come out clean and the cake should have very slightly pulled away from the sides of the pan. If they are not ready, close the oven door gently and wait another minute or two.
• When the layers are baked, let them cool on a rack for about 15 minutes. Then carefully remove them from the pans and cool them completely on the rack. Don’t frost until everything is completely cooled.
• Leveling the cake: if your cake layers came out very lopsided, or puffy in the middle, then at this point, I recommend leveling the layers for the sake of symmetry. There are bunches of videos on youtube about how to do this; I like this one which is quite simple.
• Make the frosting when you intend to ice the cake—this is not a thing you can make the day before. To make the frosting, mix together the cocoa powder and the melted plant butter in a medium bowl, using a whisk. Then add in the powdered sugar, 1/3 at a time, the vanilla, the cayenne and cinnamon (if you are using them) and the milk. All of this will quickly change from a bunch of different things into a nice smooth frosting.
• For a two-layer cake, set the bottom layer on whatever you intend to use as a serving dish. I used the cake stand shown in the photo. I also used the chocolate icing for the center filling. You could also use a jam—next time I will likely use a thin layer of raspberry or cherry jam. Once you’ve created a nice, uniform coat, carefully add on and center the top layer.
• To frost the sides and top of the cake, I recommend that you take a quick look at some youtube videos. This one is very very direct and nice. But first of all, since this is a simple, homey cake, I recommend a simple, homey approach to the frosting. This frees you to understand this as a simple process. The goal is to evenly coat the sides and top, avoid bald spots, and grout up the gap between the layers. Don’t overthink it. Use the edge of your offset spatula, use a metal ruler, use a metal frying pan spatula, use whatever implement you think can be pressed into service.
• Then, if you like, while the frosting is still fresh, you may add some patterns—for instance, swirling with the edge of the spatula using a fork or spoon or a spatula.

Kitchen Notes

Size and shape. You may also use a 9 x 13 x 2 pan (20-25 minutes,) or a 12-cup bundt pan (50-55 minutes) or cupcake tins (22-26 minutes). You can make a three-layer cake—in that case, use 3 8-inch cake pans. You should NOT use springform pans. This batter is too thin and runny for that type of pan and will end up adorning the bottom of your oven.

Dusting the cake pans. After you lightly oil the pans, sprinkle flour lightly around, then gently tap the pan on the counter to spread the flour evenly.

Buttermilk or... The original recipe called for plain milk, and you may certainly use that if you wish. But buttermilk gives this an additional delicious tang. If you don’t have buttermilk, you can add 1 teaspoon white vinegar or lemon juice to 1 cup milk.

Why plant butter? The foundational recipe calls for plain all-purpose vegetable oil. You can use that, which will give a coarser crumb; you can also use actual butter. For this, I used Country Crock Plant Butter with avocado oil, a product I like a lot for baking.

The powdered sugar. I used Domino’s confectioner’s sugar. Use the powdered sugar you prefer, bur I do recommend using a name-brand product—for me, Domino’s performs a lot better than the lower cost store brands, and the price difference is pretty minor.

Heat things up with cayenne. This gives a faintly spicy extra note to your cake, which develops slowly as the initial chocolate hit subsides.  For the frosting, I've also suggested adding a bit of cayenne plus some cinnamon.  All this makes me think of wonderful Mexican hot chocolate. If you loooove spicy things, add another teaspoon or even two to the batter. Or, yes, you can leave it out entirely.

Spreading the icing. I use an offset spatula which I bought at Dehillerin in Paris years ago (humble brag). Yes, Wilton makes one just like it. Yes, you can use other tools. You can use the front edge of a thin metal frying-pan spatula. You can use the edge of a ruler. You probably have something with a sharp, straight, easily washable straight edge around the house that would work.

And the cake stand. Our friend Liz has asked us to talk about where the dishes we show here came from. This cake stand dates back to the 1950s. I seem to recall that we acquired it some time around 1990 at a flea market in Missouri.