Midnight Mint Chocolate Cake
Would you like to save this recipe?
We'll email this post to you, so you can come back to it later!
Send this recipe to my email.
Midnight Mint Chocolate Cake. A dark chocolate easy-to-make scratch cake with layers of peppermint flavoured buttercream frosting and a chocolate glaze finish.
Originally published April 2012.
This Midnight Mint Chocolate Cake came about as the result of me I recently asking our followers a question over on our rapidly growing Facebook Page. (Like our page Here)
The mission was to suggest a new flavour combination for a layer cake. They came up with some very interesting ideas, more of which I may try later.
One very obvious combination several commenters and emailers suggested was chocolate mint. I suddenly realized I had never tried this flavour in a cake since I was a kid, experimenting in the kitchen.
So as a return to my experimental youth, I decided a chocolate mint cake it would be. This was an utterly delicious success.
If you are a chocolate mint lover, this is going to be one dangerous cake to have around...irresistible!
You might also like our Midnight Mint Thumbprint Cookies.
Like this Midnight Mint Chocolate Cake Recipe?
Find many more ideas like this in our Cakes & Pies category.
It's easy to keep up with the latest home style cooking & baking ideas from Rock Recipes. Be sure to follow Rock Recipes Facebook Page and follow us on Instagram.
Plus you'll see daily recipe suggestions from decadent desserts to quick delicious weekday meals too.
You can also sign up for our FREE newsletter to know immediately when we add new recipes. You'll also get weekly suggestions for great family friendly meals and desserts too!
Rock Recipes a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. Our product recommendations are almost exclusively for those we currently use or have used in the past.
Midnight Mint Chocolate Cake
This Midnight Mint Chocolate Cake is a delicious combination of dark chocolate cake and creamy mint frosting with a chocolate mint glaze to beautifully finish it.
Ingredients
For the cake batter
- 2 cups sugar
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- ¾ cup cocoa
- 2 teaspoon . baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup soured milk, milk plus 1 tablespoon lemon juice or vinegar
- 1 cup black coffee
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For the mint frosting
- 8 cups icing sugar, (i.e. powdered sugar / confectioners sugar)
- 1 cup vegetable shortening
- 1 cup butter
- 6 tablespoon milk, approximately
- 1 tablespoon mint extract, NOT artificial mint flavoring
For the chocolate ganache glaze
- 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
- ¼ cup whipping cream
- 2 teaspoon mint extract
Instructions
To prepare the cake batter
- Combine all cake batter 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 completely on a wire rack.
- When completely cooled, split the two layers horizontally with a serrated bread knife to make 4 layers.
To prepare the mint frosting
- Using an electric mixer on low, mix the butter, shortening and icing sugar together until the butter and shortening break up and get evenly dispersed throughout the sugar in small pieces. The mixture will still appear dry at this point. This stage ensures even distribution and prevents butter or shortening lumps in your frosting.
- Add the mint extract and a couple of tablespoon milk. Add more as needed to bring the frosting to a creamy, spreadable consistency. Both of these liquid measures can be adjusted. The milk can be adjusted to make a thicker frosting by adding less or a more spreadable frosting by adding a little more. Use you own judgement here. The mint extract can be adjusted to your own taste. Add more if you want a more intense mint flavor.
- When the icing reaches the desired consistently continue to beat it on high speed for 5 minutes to incorporate more air into the frosting to make it lighter and fluffier.
- Frost the middle and sides evenly with the frosting and chill the cake for several hours before adding the chocolate ganache glaze.
To make the chocolate ganache glaze
- In a double boiler melt together the chocolate chips, whipping cream and mint extract.
- Stir this mix constantly and get it off the heat as soon as the chocolate is melted. You do not want this mixture hot but just luke warm; as close to the melting point as possible. Let it cool down if it gets too hot.
- Working as quickly as you can, ( a lazy susan is a big help if you have onpour the ganache directly in the center of the cake, and then using an icing spatula spread it evenly over the top of the cake, letting it drip off the sides.
- For butter and/or shortening based frostings like this, I do store the cake in the refrigerator but take it out at least an hour before serving to let the frosting warm up to room temperature. Cold frosting is too hard and letting the cake warm up allows this frosting to return to the creamy texture it is meant to have.
Recommended Products
Rock Recipes a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. Our product recommendations are almost exclusively for those we currently use or have used in the past.
Nutrition Information
Yield
16Serving Size
1 sliceAmount Per Serving Calories 760Total Fat 38gSaturated Fat 16gTrans Fat 1gUnsaturated Fat 19gCholesterol 68mgSodium 336mgCarbohydrates 105gFiber 2gSugar 86gProtein 5g
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.
Making this right now with my 12 yr. old son, who wanted to make a 'legit' cake (which means a cake not made from a box, I guess). We just put the cakes in the oven, and honestly, could have just eaten the batter...it's THAT good! We're very anxious for them to be done. We plan on eating it tonight for dessert. Thanks for the AWESOME recipe!!!
I made this cake for my husbands 40th birthday. It took awhile but it was so worth it! Yuuummmm. I followed the recipe exactly.
Lovely recipe. I wish you could give us the measures in metric conversion.
Too time consuming I'm afraid to convert 1400 recipes. Equivalents are easily found online.
The name Mint chocolate deserves it... nice name.
I bought real mint extract...it has more of a spearmint flavor. Should ai get peppermint instead? This cake is for my brothers birthday...he loves Breyers Chocolate Chip Mint Ice cream...not sure what mint they use either???
I think either would be fine.
Using an electric mixer on low, mix the butter and icing sugar together until the butter and shortening break up and get evenly dispersed throughout the sugar in small pieces. The mixture will still appear dry at this point. This stage ensures even distribution and prevents butter or shortening lumps in your frosting.
Just noticed in Step 1 for the Icing that you seem to have missed adding the shortening to the butter and icing sugar but mention it later.
Fixed now.
Not sure the amount of milk, your recipe reads: tbsp Approximately 6 milk
Is this 6 TBsp. milk? Thanks.
Fixed now.
Why the vegetable shortening? Why not just all butter? What does the vegetable shortening add/do for the recipe? Thanks
If you can’t get mint extract can you use the artificial one ?
Not much other choice, I guess.