Saturday, January 30, 2010

First Bake of Year 2010 - Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake

Welcome year 2010! I stopped baking & blogging since school holidays in Nov 2009. Lazy! Haha. Mainly due to I was busy holidaying during Nov & Dec. And when the year started, gosh, I was never been so busy before. This is mainly due to both my boys study at new schools this year - Caden in nursery class at Yuk Yu Kindergarten and Jaden is in Primary 1 at SJK(C) Chung Hwa Likas. Just sending & fetching them to/from schools, to beat the traffic jam itself is a challenging job. On top of that, I was not fully recovered from my cough/flu since Dec 2009. Very, very busy & tiring. Finally last weekend I managed to find some time in a Sunday afternoon. This cake has been in my top of the "must try out" list. I tried to look for Hershey cocoa powder in KK but could not find it until i went to Singapore during X'mas and managed to buy 1 box from there. However, after my Singapore trip, my friend told me that can buy it at Merdeka Supermarket. And it costs slightly cheaper than Singapore Dollars. Sigh! Anyway, I gave it a try and it turned out to be one of my favourite cakes!


It's so moist that I need to double layer the cup cakes.


See how moist the cake is!

I tried the cup cake version. Let's look at the ingredients & steps:

Ingredients:
  • 2 cups sugar (I put 1-3/4 cups. Still very sweet for me. Next time should reduce to 1.5 cups only)
  • 1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1 cup boiling water
  • "PERFECTLY CHOCOLATE" CHOCOLATE FROSTING(recipe follows)

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350°F or 180°C. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans.

2. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour batter into prepared pans.

3. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely. Frost with "PERFECTLY CHOCOLATE" CHOCOLATE FROSTING. 10 to 12 servings.

VARIATIONS:
ONE-PAN CAKE: Grease and flour 13x9x2-inch baking pan. Heat oven to 350° F. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake 35 to 40 minutes. Cool completely. Frost.

THREE LAYER CAKE: Grease and flour three 8-inch round baking pans. Heat oven to 350°F. Pour batter into prepared pans. Bake 30 to 35 minutes. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely. Frost.

BUNDT CAKE: Grease and flour 12-cup Bundt pan. Heat oven to 350°F. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake 50 to 55 minutes. Cool 15 minutes; remove from pan to wire rack. Cool completely. Frost.

CUPCAKES: Line muffin cups (2-1/2 inches in diameter) with paper bake cups. Heat oven to 350°F. Fill cups 2/3 full with batter. Bake 22 to 25 minutes. Cool completely. Frost. About 30 cupcakes.


"PERFECTLY CHOCOLATE" CHOCOLATE FROSTING (I omitted this part coz i think the cake is sweet enough.)

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine
2/3 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
3 cups powdered sugar
1/3 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Melt butter. Stir in cocoa. Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating to spreading consistency. Add small amount additional milk, if needed. Stir in vanilla. About 2 cups frosting.