Scrumptious Chocolate Cake

Last week was a fairly stressful week around our house and on Friday I just really needed to do something I enjoyed.  After throwing my two youngest kids in the jogging stroller and walking for 3 miles, I decided to bake a cake.  Ironic, I know, seeing as how I had just excercised, but I really didn't care.  So any-who, last week I searched for "the best chocolate cake recipe" on Pinterest.  I've been trying to find the YUMMIEST cake recipes lately and I thought I'd see what everyone else deemed as "the best".  Of course I wanted to start with chocolate.  I found this picture/pin several times and decided to check it out over at the Kevin & Amanda blog.

I was actually going to try and bake one from scratch, but this one uses a box mix and I figured I might as well keep things simple - yet again.  The recipe is also very similar to family a recipe that I love, but had only ever made as a bundt cake.  Amanda's recipe includes milk, (and a couple of other measurements were slightly different), but the biggest difference between my sister-in-laws recipe that I use and this one is that this cake was a little bit more spongy and lite.  The bundt cake recipe we use is more dense and we don't even bother using any type of frosting on it.  We just sprinkle some powdered sugar on top.

I like this recipe for a cake as opposed to a bundt, since it's lighter. 

I had really been wanting to try this petal frosting technique for a while and I'm glad that I finally did.  It was so easy to do and has such an impressive result.  I'm sure I'll be frosting other cakes this way in the near future!  {I really can't remember which tutorial found for this frosting technique, but if you google "petal frosting technique" I'm sure a couple of them will pop up right away.}

 

Here is the exact recipe from Kevin and Amanda, along with a link back to her original post:

The Best Chocolate Cake Ever

1 box devil’s food cake mix
1 small pkg Jello instant chocolate pudding mix
1 cup sour cream
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups mini chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In a very large bowl, mix together everything except chocolate chips. Batter will be thick. Stir in the chocolate chips. Pour batter into cake pan of choice (I normally use two 9-inch pie pans). For cooking time, I use the cooking times on the back of the devil’s food cake box as a guide and usually add 10 mins to whatever it says. Then I do the toothpick check, and if it’s not done, I check on it every 5 mins after that. It usually takes around 45 mins for two, 9-inch pie pans.

Buttercream Frosting

1 cup shortening (Crisco)
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup heavy whipping cream
In a mixing bowl, cream shortening until fluffy. Add sugar and continue creaming until well blended. Add salt, vanilla, and whipping cream. Blend on low speed until moistened. Beat at high speed until frosting is fluffy.

Read More http://www.kevinandamanda.com/recipes/dessert/the-best-chocolate-cake.html#ixzz1k8ancWqQ

For the cake I used a Betty Crocker's Triple Chocolate Fudge mix and I used light sour cream.
For the frosting I used milk instead of heavy whipping cream because the whipping cream I had in my fridge had expired.