Chocolate Cake with Italian Chocolate Buttercream Frosting
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Chocolate Cake with Italian Chocolate Buttercream Frosting. The easiest & best chocolate scratch cake covered in melt-in-your-mouth, luscious Italian chocolate buttercream frosting. Just outstanding!
Good chocolate cake may be the perfect dessert and this one does not disappoint. It deserves to be a standard in every family recipe collection.
It is the best plain chocolate frosted cake that I have ever eaten. The chocolate Italian buttercream frosting can be a bit of a challenge, especially in a hot kitchen.
However, it is well, well worth the effort to master this skill. It really is the best chocolate frosting ever; so luscious and so, so silky smooth.
The detailed recipe gives you step by step instructions on how to make Italian chocolate buttercream frosting like an expert.
Originally Published March 7, 2008.
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Chocolate Buttercream Cake
The best chocolate scratch cake ever layered and covered in melt-in-your-mouth luscious Italian chocolate buttercream frosting.
Ingredients
For the Chocolate Cake
- 2 cups sugar
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- ¾ cup cocoa
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup soured milk, add a tablespoon of lemon juice to sour the milk
- 1 cup black coffee
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For the chocolate buttercream frosting
- 1 pound chocolate, at least 50% cocoa, chopped in small pieces
- ½ cup butter
- 2 cups sugar
- ⅔ cup water
- 6 egg whites at room temperature
- ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
- 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pinch salt
- 2 cups 1 pound softened unsalted butter
For the Ganache Drizzle (optional)
- ⅓ cup chocolate chips
- 1 ½ tablespoon whipping cream
Instructions
For the chocolate cake
- Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl and beat with electric mixer for 2 minutes.
- Pour into 2 greased and floured 8 or 9 inch cake pans. Bake at 350 degrees F for 35-40 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Cool in the pans for 5 minutes, then remove from pans and cool completely on a wire rack.
To make the frosting
- Combine the chocolate and ½ cup of butter and melt (but do not over heat) in a double boiler. Set aside to cool to room temperature.
- Combine the sugar and water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil.
- Continue to boil over medium heat without stirring until the mixture reaches 240 degrees on a candy thermometer.
- Meanwhile beat together the egg whites, cream of tartar, vanilla extract and salt to stiff peaks.
- Slowly pour in the sugar syrup in a thin stream, hitting the side of the bowl and not the beaters. Continue beating the frosting for 10-15 minutes until the meringue is completely cool.
- When completely cool, slowly begin to add the butter a few tablespoons at a time. Beat until smooth after each addition.
- Add the melted chocolate to the meringue mixture in about 4 additions and beat well after each addition.
- Continue beating until frosting reaches a spreadable consistency. This may take 15 minutes or so and you may have to chill the frosting for several minutes before beating it again to get it to stiffen. Alternatively, you can place the frosting bowl in an ice bath while continuing to beat constantly until the icing stiffens sufficiently.
To construct the cake
- Split the cake layers in half, horizontally, making 4 layers in total. Fill layers with frosting and spread over the entire cake. Garnish with chocolate ganache or chocolate curls if desired.
Chocolate Ganache
- It's best to add the drizzle when the frosting has been chilled on the cake for an hour or so.
- In a double boiler, combine and melt the chocolate and cream but be careful not to overheat it.
- Spoon the ganache into a Ziploc bag and snip off a corner with sharp scissors. Use the bag to drizzle the chocolate in continuous circular motions all over the surface of the cake.
Notes
Additional time is needed to cool the cake. About 2 hours.
Nutrition Information
Yield
16Serving Size
1 sliceAmount Per Serving Calories 783Total Fat 47gSaturated Fat 25gTrans Fat 1gUnsaturated Fat 19gCholesterol 105mgSodium 487mgCarbohydrates 85gFiber 3gSugar 66gProtein 7g
The nutritional information provided is automatically calculated by third party software and is meant as a guideline only. Exact accuracy is not guaranteed. For recipes where all ingredients may not be used entirely, such as those with coatings on meats, or with sauces or dressings for example, calorie & nutritional values per serving will likely be somewhat lower than indicated.
Looks delicious, but I wouldn't have the nerve to attempt the frosting.
I don't want to over emphasize the difficulty level of the frosting too much. As long as you have a large stand mixer like a Kitchen Aid, it really is not that difficult and well worth the effort.
I am going to try this cake but never the icing,looks and sounds too complicated to me.I'm sure it's to die for but I don't want to die trying to make it,I'm sure I can come up with something that won't scare the dickens out of me.By the way I would love to be a guest at your house from time to time and while I'm at it may I suggest that you print with a darker color or maybe a bright blue as when I highlite your recipe and copy and paste in microsaft word I can hardly see the lettering the pictures are fine.,just a suggestion.
Leona in Nova Scotia.
Hi Leona,
The font color is very light in order to contrast with the black background of the web page. If I darken the font, you will not be able to read the web page at all as the letters will be lost against the black background. The solution for you is simply to change the font color to black once you copy it to Word.
LCS
Thank you for your recommendation I will do that ,just never thought of it,I'm not very computer savy.
Did you use semi sweet, unsweetened or bittersweet chocolate for the frosting?
I've used semi-sweet chocolate here but you could use dark. Milk chocolate would probably not be chocolate enough.
Made the chocolate buttercream over the weekend. AMAZING!!!! And if you have a kitchen aid it's easy.
Made this cake yesterday for a co-workers Birthday and it was a big hit they loved it especially the icing.
Hi Barry, is the coffee suppose to be hot or cold?
cold
I made the frosting, and it came together beautifully until I added the chocolate. It fell apart and would not firm up again. I assume the chocolate was too warm when I added it, but putting it in the freezer for 20 min then beating it more did not fix it. I've seen other recipes say to fold in the chocolate at the end.. Any suggestions for me?
Definitely too hot by the sound of it.
Yes, this frosting IS a lot of work, but if you want to put together a "wow" cake, then italian buttercream is the way to go. Swiss buttercream is perhaps a little bit easier (no sugar syrup) and is almost as good. Make no mistake, you just can't compare american buttercream (icing sugar and butter) to swiss and italian buttercream. Italian buttercream is "eat right out of the bowl" kind of delicious!
Just to confirm in my mind, the sour milk you're referring to is basically buttermilk. Yes?
Isn't there a concern with salmonella as you're using raw egg whites?
I made the amazing chocolate buttercream frosting and put it on your yellow cake. The frosting is time consuming, I had not made it since my baking class days. It is worth the time. Don't rush the cooling period, mine took about 18 min to totally cool enough for the butter. I used high quality chocolate which makes all the difference. Make this frosting, you won't be disappointed!