Brian is a man that loves to double down on his chocolate. His favorite cake in the world, one that his grandmother makes for him specifically every time we visit her in West Virginia, is chocolate cake with fudgey chocolate frosting.
His birthday was two weeks ago, and of course you know I had to do it up right by making his version of cake bliss. But, as you may have caught on at some point by reading MBA, I have a little bit of a multi-tasking problem.
Brian and Husband #2, Corey, will sit and watch me flit from one thing to another like I’m their own personal reality show for entertainment. They love to point out when my missing spatula can be found at the computer desk, or my phone in the pantry, and helpfully letting me know that the oven timer has dinged at least 15 times.
I also like to do things in excess – you know a little mound of frosting will never do in this household. I need to swirl on a pile of it on top, and then top it off with ganache just for the fun of it. So when I organized a birthday party for Brian – I of course went a little overboard.
I started my chocolate cake adventure by baking this cake – twice. Twice because I was mixing it while on the phone. Only to realize after it had baked that I left out a full cup of sugar and all of the vegetable oil. I think you can imagine how well that turned out: i.e., not at all.
I quickly whipped it up again, this time focusing my full attention on the process. The cake turned out beautifully and I quickly frosted it while preparing the other gazillion components of the meal.
After all the feasting, no one had room for cake – in fact, we left for the night without busting into song over 37 lit candles. So – a cake that was never meant to be blogged is here today simply because I made too much food (aaaand we’re right back to doing things in excess).
This cake is dark, moist, rich and incredibly decadent. Green Mountain Coffee’s Vermont Country Blend blended amazingly well with the cocoa to create the most intense and delicious chocolate cake that I have ever tasted. It’s the perfect sort of cake for a birthday or a Tuesday. Make sure to enjoy it with a very large glass of ice cold milk!
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The Best Chocolate Cake
Yield: 8 servings
Prep Time: 25 minutes
Cook Time: 35 minutes
Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tablespoons King Arthur Flour Black Cocoa, optional
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 eggs
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup strong black coffee (I used Green Mountain Coffee’s Vermont Country Blend)
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extractDirections:
1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans or one 13x9x2-inch baking pan. Set aside.
2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment or in a large bowl with an electric mixer, combine the sugar, flour, cocoa(s), baking soda, baking powder. Mix on low until dry ingredients are thoroughly combined. Add eggs, buttermilk, coffee, oil and vanilla. Beat on medium speed for about two minutes; the batter will be thin. Pour batter evenly into prepared pans.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes for round pans, 35 to 40 minutes for rectangular pan or until wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely.
4. Frost as desired. I used a simple and delicious Chocolate Buttercream Frosting from Savory Sweet Life. One batch was perfect for this layered chocolate cake.Notes:
- The Black Cocoa from King Arthur Flour is optional - it simply provides a great depth of flavor and color to the chocolate cake.
- This cake also pairs beautifully with a simple chocolate ganache.Recipe adapted from Hershey's Black Magic Cake
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{ 107 comments… read them below or add one }
Looks absolutely glorious. It’s chocolate heaven.
OHHHHH YUMMY!!!!!!!
Wow, that looks amazing! My brother loves a rich chocolate cake, I bet he’d love to have this on his birthday!
LOVE chocolate cake and this one looks perfect!!
WOW!!! That looks soooo moist and delicious, I am going to have to try this SOON!
Wow…this looks absolutely decadent. I may have to make this for one of the many fall birthdays I have coming up!
Oh my! I would love to have a piece of this cake right now. Will have to get the King Arthur cocoa. extra yum.
Mmm this sounds lovely! Yum.
Seriously, this scratch cake is one of the moistest looking I’ve ever seen and your frosting is perfect.
Ohhh ahhh. this reminds me of the Black Magic cake from hersheys! YUMMO
Leslie-
Yep, same cake which is also very similar to Ina Garten’s “Beatty’s Cake. Both delish!
-Jamie
This cake does look insanely good! No wonder it is such a hit.
oh MY WORD! that looks like heaven!! so moist and dense. wow
Most beautiful chocolate cake I’ve ever seen. Really.
Now that’s an amazing birthday gift, chocolate and more chocolate. Lucky man!
Gorgeous cake! This looks SO tasty…yum!
This reminds me of Ina Garten’s chocolate cake – that addition of coffee is GENIUS. It’s one of my favorite things to do with a chocolate cake! YUM. I’ve never heard of black cocoa – I need to look for that.
And Vermont Country Blend is one of my favorite coffees! Good choice
This looks aaaaaamaaaaaazing. I want some. With an extra dollop of frosting, please.
and if I can have it on one of those cute square plates, all the better.
Oh my God!!! This cake looks divine!!! I love how dark and rich it looks, but moist at the same time. Man, what I wouldn’t give for a slice of this right now!
This cake sounds amazing! I will test it out for a birthday next week.
Thanks for another great post!
That cake looks gorgeous and devilishly chocolaty!
Cheers,
Rosa
What a heavenly sight that is! I wish so much I could munch on a slice of that right now
This looks wonderful! I’m going to try and make it tomorrow in cupcakes. I just happen to need some for work.
This looks like the perfect thing. I’m mean how good can a chocolate cake be than this? Love it!
I just made a very similar chocolate cake with chocolate ganache frosting and pistachio cream filling…Delicious. It’s my fiancé favorite! Just used hot water instead of coffee, next time I’ll surely try this one!
love the dark color
The colour and texture of this cake look perfect, it looks so good. I’d love a giant slice right now!
I’m not even a chocolate cake fan and I want a slice of this right now… actually, you take a slice and i’ll keep the rest of the cake.
Gorgeous, gorgeous cake. Drooling off the screen. Bookmarked.
That recipe sounds just like the one I used to make a wedding cake recently…it’s absolutely delicious – moist, rich, and tasty. I recommend trying it with a coffee/mocha buttercream…to die for!
Jamie, may I recommend Brian (and you) to have a look at a chocolate cake that is not made of cocoa but made of a chocolate couverture from Barry (hit my link).
I like the quick, easy and affordable way of making chocolate cake with cocoa but nothing compares to a cake using melted chocolate couverture and other noble ingredients. It’s amazingly rich, dense, moist like a brownie with no sugar overpower and the texture is way superior to that of a spongy cake. You have to try to believe it.
I’ve got buttermilk in the fridge and now I want to abandon my to do list for today and make this cake instead!
I feel the same way as I run around the kitchen! Reading the story was like reliving any night in my kitchen! Love the chocolate cake-yum!!
I can’t believe you didn’t cut into that cake! I think I would have skipped dinner and gone straight to dessert…
This looks sooo incredibly decadent! Love it! My husband will love it! What is there not to love? I don’t understand how the family missed out on this cake!
I love chocolate cake and am always looking for that perfect recipe. Tell me, why oil in a cake instead of butter. I’ve always wondered about the differences.
I once made a chocolate cake and forgot to put any sugar in at all. Yuck!
LOL, your story sounds similar to mine at home. I’ve always got dozens of things going on at the same time. By the way, the cake looks delish!
I make a very similar cake like this from Ina Garten… I can attest to the coffee making all the difference in the richness. It is like chocolate cake heaven!!
THAT is stunning. I want. I want, now.
What brand of unsweetened cocoa powder do you use? Can you use dutch processed?
Thanks
Well, it seems a wonderful yummy yummy treat. Congrats
Mary Jo Zilveti
Ok i am goin got try this one.. i made ina gartens chocoate cake 3 times and it sunk in the center all 3 times.. i even change the baking soda and powder for new ones just to see if that wa the problem… i was so crazy Sergio was watching and shaking his head.. i just could not get it right.. so ill try this again.. cross your fingers for me….
It looks great !!!
Have you checked your oven temperature? Often the cause of a sunken middle is under-baking. I wouldn’t advise this with yellow or white cake mixes, but I’ve never come across a dry chocolate cake recipe. Make sure you don’t open the door of the oven at all until the lower baking limit has passed (a lot of sites say 20 minutes, but I find that’s not enough) and don’t be afraid to go past the upper baking limit if the cake doesn’t seem done. Additionally, if you live in a more humid location than where the recipe was created there could be more moisture in the batter not accounted for in the recipe that has to bake out before the cake can set properly.
thanks ill try this.. and yes i am in florida and it can be humid here ( like all the time ) lol
Is there any coffee taste? I really don’t care for coffee but this cake looks amazing!
Kelly-
Depending on the coffee that you use, there may be a slight coffee undertone. The coffee seems to intensify the chocolate more than anything. Have a great day and thanks so much for stopping by.
Jamie
I made this cake just the other day for my husband. He HATES coffee and never knew it was in there. I didn’t use the black cocoa since I didn’t have any and it was still fabulous. I thought it tasted even better the second day.
absolutely gorgeous. i could take a slice of that right about now…
JAMIE, I THOUGHT THE OPRAH WINFREY CHOCOLATE CAKE WAS YOUR FAVORITE CHOCOLATE CAKE. I WONDER WHERE I GOT THAT IDEA. OH WELL THANKS FOR ANOTHER DELISH RECIPE. COFFEE IN A CHOCOLATE CAKE? NO PROBLEM! HERE IN N.O. WE START OUR BABIES ON WHAT WE CALL “COFFEE MILK ” WHEN THEY TURN 2 YEARS OLD.(IT’S ABOUT 1/4 COFFEE AND 3/4 MILK.). THEY THINK THEY ARE HAVING COFFEE LIKE THE GROWN-UPS.
NEW ORLEANS HONEY
Except for the buttermilk and an extra tsp of baking soda, this is identical to a one-bowl cake I already make, but the batter for my recipe is already super thin – I’d be terrified that the extra cup of liquid would make the cake too thin to do anything! At the same time, I’m very, very curious to try it out!
Ginger-
The batter is definitely thin, but it transforms into an amazing cake – I promise!
-Jamie
HEY JAMIE,
HOW ABOUT MAKING IT SO WHEN WE PRINT RECIPE THE PICTURE ALSO PRINTS ON RECIPE?
JUST A THOUGHT.
Thanks for you input. We are actually working on that feature, so stay tuned.
-Jamie
Where can I find the recipe for the ganache? Cake looks amazingly delicious!
nm found ot on the blog link you posted THANK YOU!
This absolutely IS the BEST Chocolate Cake EVER!!!! Soooo excited that you posted a blog on it!!!! Now I want to go make it. Ugh…. and it’s not even my birthday! lol I was just wondering if you could tell us which frosting you used on the cake in the picture? It looks perfect, and I’m always looking for a good fudge frosting
) Please share!!!
Hi-
Thanks for stopping by. There is a link to the frosting in the notes section of the recipe.
-Jamie
I think you just made up my mind-I’m making chocolate cake this weekend.Looks delicious
I have been wanting to find a great plain old chocolate cake recipe. This looks perfect!
Wow, this looks like a glorious cake that I would love to consume. It reminds me of Death by Chocolate, and because of the amount of chocolate in this recipe, I really think it could be a death by chocolate. However, is it possible to omit the coffee in the cake? If so, do you just replace the amount of coffee with water or milk?
The cake looks absolutely heaven. I’m glad you blogged it so that now I can make it, too!
My sugar levels have dropped to all times low just looking at those photos! The cake looks amazing to say the least
This does look like the best chocolate cake!!! I will have to give it a try soon- one of my friends birthdays is next week..perfect!
Must eat now! I wish, I wish.
I came by way of foodgawker (couldn’t resist the picture) and was amazed when I saw the recipe. I make the same cake (made it last weekend in fact) from an old newspaper clipping. The only difference in the clipping is it specifies using half brown sugar and half white and it lists sour cream or yogurt as possible substitutes for the buttermilk.
It is a fab cake, super dark and moist and delish. And very, very easy to make.
To make it eggless just sub 2 tbsp vinegar for the eggs. No one will ever know.
Would it be terribly wrong of me to make this for MY hubs’ bday? He claims his favorite is white wedding cake, but I be he’d eat this!! (and chocolate is my favorite!!)
I’m not a fan of coffee, is there anything I can substitute in? I’d normally just leave it out, but since you use a whole cup, I feel like simply leaving it out would ruin the dry to wet ingredient ratio.
Alyssa-
You can substitute a cup of hot water for the coffee. Thanks for stopping by.
-Jamie
This does look like a fantastic chocolate cake. I know my husband would just love it! There’s just something about baking chocolate cake made with coffee… I love the richness it adds to the chocolate flavor!
Thank you for being so ADD & accidentally making this cake!! This DOES look like the perfect Chocolate Cake – BEAUTIFUL & Thank You!
It sure looks great!
I’m pretty sure you don’t need one more person telling you how amazing that cake looks –but, DANG, that looks amazing!
Did my browser screw up?…the formatting of the ingredients cut out how much cocoa…looked through comments, but didn’t find the answer…
It looks great, but don’t want to try until I know how much cocoa to use…
The recipe calls for 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder. Everything looks good on my end, so I have no idea why it isn’t showing up for you. Hope this helps – thanks for stopping by.
Jamie
This looks incredible. I’ve been trying to find a good chocolate cake recipe. This is the one for me.
Wow .. I keep on returning just to have a look at this cake … It looks sooo yummmy …. Cant wait to try … I think I will make it for my wedding anniversary
Thanks for sharing
That looks beyond amazing! I want to dive into the whole cake.
Oh no – I’ve left out crucial ingredients like that before when baking distracted (even more dangerous than talking on the phone while driving??). Leaden cakes that are missing their liquid fat are sad cakes indeed.
Wish I tried this one instead of “Gale Gand’s – Chocolate Layer Cake” I did eany meany miney moe and chose her chocolate cake. Taste was there but very wet.
Have you ever tried her recipe? I would love to know what you think.
Brian must have really enjoyed his birthday with such a cake, looks so heavenly delicious. Now that you made in excess, you mind sharing
It is looks amazing , but can i skiped buttermilk or not ?
This looks so deliciously rich and perfectly moist!
When I pulled the cakes out of the oven they fell totally flat in the middle. Blah! I followed the recipe to the T. Any ideas on what could have possibly gone wrong?
Maggie-
Typically when a cake falls in the center, it is not cooked all the way through. I have made this recipe many times and have never experienced the center falling. I have had the centers fall on me in cupcake form though – simply because I took them out too early. Hope this helps.
-Jamie
I’m so glad I found this! Your recipe came up automatically on my Zite app on the ipad. I immediately went to the kitchen and made the cake, then the next day got too busy to go back and mark the article so I lost it. After some fancy footwork on Google, I managed to find you, because it would have been tragedy if I never made this recipe again!
This cake has what I would consider a “packet-cake” style crumb – very smooth and uniform in texture, rather than the softer crumb that comes with using butter. I’ve never been able to replicate that texture with a homemade cake (because sometimes that is just what you are after!) and now I can.
Your blog is now bookmarked so I can come back and make this one again soon.
Zena, I found a great trick to making buttermilk – just add a tablespoon of white vinegar to warm milk and it will thicken and curdle perfectly and give you just the right amount of acid to replace buttermilk.
I made this cake the other day, it’s a really lovely deep, dark chocolatey flavor! It’s nice and moist too, and turned out perfectly! I didn’t have any buttermilk on hand, so just substituted with yogurt and it worked out just fine! I made the recipe into one 8in cake and 12 cupcakes.
No coffee taste in mine, it just added more depth to the chocolate flavor. Just wanted to come by and say thanks for a wonderful recipe =)
this looks lovely! do you think it would work for a wedding cake, density wise? also where in west virginia is your husbands grandmother?
Wow what a beautiful cake. I would like to try making this. I doubt mine will turn out nearly as good as yours looks though. You are incredibly talented. Thank you for the recipe.
This looks extremely moist. wow
Could this be adapted into cupcakes? This looks utterly divine! I want to live in it. Just forward my mail to the rich dark chocolate center.
Thank you for my new go-to cake recipe! Made this for a bake sale before and I’m now making it for a birthday of a set of triplets I know (paired with pb frosting).
omg…this cake was fabulous…i made it twice this weekend because my family devoured it and wanted more!!
Lynn-
Thanks so much for reporting back! I am so happy you enjoyed this cake. Happy Holidays to you and your family!
-Jamie
This cake is delicious. Although without the filling and raspberries (or in my case strawberries), it is the same recipe that won the King Arthur Flour’s cake contest back in 2010. http://whisktogether.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/chocolate-covered-strawberry-cake/
It is at King Arthur Flour as the Chocolate Mousse Raspberry Cake – simply divine!! Just another idea how to make this cake fancy.
I am totally making this during my winter break! <3 thank you sooo much for posting this!
Dear Jamie,
i intend to do it again this week! 
Just wanted to leave u a note to let u know: i tried the recipe and it is FABulous! I love it. the cake turned out awesome, indeed one of the best chocolate cakes!
Thanks so much for posting! will post in my blog soon!
Happy holidays!
Kajal
Kajal-
I’m so thrilled that you enjoyed these! Thanks so much for taking the time to comment! Happy Holidays!
-Jamie
ooh looks sooo yummy
The cake looks delicious! I plan on making this for my boyfriends birthday tomorrow, but I have a question for you. I can’t find King Arthur Flour Black Cocoa, should I use anything else to substitute for it, or just add more cocoa powder?
Brittany-
Just use regular cocoa in place of the Black Cocoa Powder. Have a great day!
-Jamie
I baked this cake earlier, and made the frosting you recommended, and the cake is now in the fridge with the crumb coat of icing on, waiting for the final coat…looks SO great! Can’t wait to try some!!!! The frosting is delicious!
I recently made this for my best friend’s Sweet 16 and she and all my other friends loved it! It was soooo good and really easy to make. My mom loved it too and told me to definitely keep the recipe. Officially my new favorite chocolate cake recipe! Thanks for posting it!
I can’t WAIT to make this cake!
I made this cake for the Super Bowl. I made it in two 8-inch pans and three cupcakes (go figure). I gave my son a cupcake and asked if he tasted the coffee in it. He said he ate it too fast to tell and needed another. Yeah, I’m a sucker. This time he took three bites and it was gone. This cake is perfect and you must add the dark cocoa. I didn’t have the time (okay, patience) to find the KA’s Black Cocoa, but Hershey’s Special Dark seemed to do the trick. Amazingly moist and dark. The absolute best part was the buttercream frosting suggested. I was fancy enough to use Plugra unsalted butter. I used two tablespoons of regular milk (1% which is regular to me) and two tablespoons of buttermilk (just to give it a tang). AWESOMENESS. So easy to work with and it was plenty for the cake. I took pictures of it and put it on Facebook. I shared half of it. The only hard part is to stop eating it. My new go to chocolate-layer cake. You can stop looking. Seriously.
Hi Jamie Just to let you know I made your cake for the Ultimate Chocolate Cake recipe. Its wonderful and is surely a keeper. Come visit and check it out.. Thanks andi
Jamie,
If these were cupcakes…how long would they bake for?
Thanks so much!