Yellow "Birthday" Cake With Chocolate Frosting

Does anyone else have a soft spot for this classic cake?


I'm a big fan of yellow box cake, with chocolate frosting. Probably my favorite birthday cake. And even though it's nowhere near my birthday, it kind of felt like it yesterday when my mom surprised me with a box full of baking supplies/goods and an electric hand mixer.

To celebrate, I decided to try this recipe which I found the other day (and for which I happened to have all the ingredients stocked) and it's delicious!

Thought I share in case anyone else loved this cake as much as I do.

I used a large bundt pan rather than two rounds as that was all I have and had to adjust the temp accordingly (350 for 35 mins).

Enjoy!

www.kingarthurflour.com...

INGREDIENTS
Choose your measure: Volume Ounces Grams
CAKE
2 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour OR Gluten Free Measure for Measure Flour
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
4 large eggs
2 cups granulated sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon almond extract; optional, for enhanced flavor
1 cup milk (whole milk preferred)
4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) butter, cut into pats
1/3 cup vegetable oil
FROSTING
1 1/4 cups natural cocoa powder (sifted if lumpy)
1 cup + 3 cups confectioners' sugar (sifted if lumpy)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup hot water
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
16 tablespoons (1 cup) butter, softened
*See “tips,” below for an alternative to natural cocoa.

INSTRUCTIONS
1. To make the cake: Preheat the oven to 325°F with a rack in the center. Lightly grease two 8” x 2” or 9” x 2” round cake pans; for extra protection against sticking, line the bottom of the pans with parchment rounds (you can cut these yourself or use precut 8” or 9” rounds), and grease the parchment. If your 8” pans aren’t at least 2” deep, use 9” pans.
2. Weigh your flour; you’ll find its weight by toggling to “grams” at the top of the ingredient section above. Or measure it by gently spooning it into a cup, then sweeping off any excess.
3. In a small bowl, combine the flour, salt, and baking powder. Set aside.
4. In a large mixing bowl, either using an electric hand mixer or a stand mixer with whisk attachment, beat the eggs, sugar, vanilla, and almond extract, if using, until thickened and light gold in color, about 2 minutes at medium-high speed. If your stand mixer doesn’t have a whisk attachment, beat for 5 minutes using the paddle attachment. The batter should fall in thick ribbons from the beaters, whisk, or paddle.
5. Add the dry ingredients to the mixture in the bowl and mix — by hand or on low speed of a mixer — just enough to combine. Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl, then mix again briefly, to fully incorporate any residual flour or sticky bits.
6. In a saucepan set over medium heat or in the microwave, bring the milk just to a simmer. Remove the pan from the heat and add the butter and oil, stirring by hand until the butter has melted.
7. Slowly mix the hot milk-butter-oil mixture into the batter, stirring on low speed of a mixer until everything is well combined. Scrape the bowl and mix briefly, just until smooth.
8. Divide the batter evenly between the two pans. You’ll use about 2 3/4 cups (about 580g) in each.
9. Bake the cakes until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the top feels set, 26 to 30 minutes for two 9” pans, or 38 to 42 minutes for two 8” pans; a digital thermometer inserted into the center of the cakes should read 205°F. Remove the cakes from the oven, carefully loosen the edges, and allow them to cool for 15 minutes in the pans. Then turn them out of the pans and transfer them to a rack, right-side up, to cool to room temperature.


To make the frosting:
1. In a large mixing bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer, stir together - by hand or mixer - the cocoa powder, 1 cup (113g) of the confectioners’ sugar, and the salt. Stir in the water and vanilla, scraping the bowl if necessary.
2. Add the butter and remaining confectioners’ sugar, stirring to combine. Using an electric hand mixer or a stand mixer with paddle attachment, beat the frosting at medium-high speed for 1 to 2 minutes, until lightened in color and fluffy, stopping halfway through to scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl.
3. To assemble the cake: Place one of the cake layers on a serving plate; tuck pieces of waxed or parchment paper underneath the edge of the cake to keep the plate clean. Spread the bottom layer with about 1 cup of frosting, enough to make a 1/4” to 1/2”-thick layer. Center the second layer bottom-side up (for a flat top) over the frosted layer and press gently to set it in place.
4. If your schedule permits, place the cake in the refrigerator or freezer, uncovered, for at least 30 minutes (or up to 2 hours) to firm it up. This will make the layers less likely to slide around as you work, and the cake won’t shed crumbs as you frost. If you’re pressed for time, you can skip this step.
5. To finish the cake: For the best-looking cake, do the frosting in two steps. First, spread a very thin layer of frosting around the sides and across the top; this is called a crumb coat. You should be able to see the cake through the frosting in spots, it’s that thin. Refrigerate the cake for 20 minutes to let this layer set. Again, skip this step if time is a factor.
6. Once the cake is chilled, use the remaining frosting to coat it thoroughly and evenly. If you have any leftover frosting, you can use it to pipe decorations on the top and/or around the base.
7. Store the cake, covered, at room temperature, or in the refrigerator if your kitchen is hot. Let it come to room temperature before serving.

Storage information: The cake will keep at room temperature, covered with a cake cover, for up to three days; in the refrigerator, covered, for up to one week, or in the freezer, well wrapped, for up to one month.

That looks just delicious. My mother also made our birthday cakes and that icing looks deliciously familiar. Thanks for the visual. Alas, I am diabetic.

a reply to: Justso

The picture is not from my lovely creation (how did the baker get the icing like that!?) but I'm glad you could at least enjoy the visuals

A scratch cake is sooo much better than a box cake if the ingredients are good. King arthur flour is pretty good but I changed to Dakota maid organic flour now, it seems much better for cakes and crusts. It is pure wheat flour though, no malted barley or rye, so adding a little barley flour brings out the taste, just a tablespoondoes the job.

Also, cane sugar has a mellower taste than beet sugar and in some cakes, corn oil gives a better taste than the wesson or other brand vegetable oils. We do use regular vegetable oil still, but in a yellow cake corn oil might add some extra good flavor. We have not tried it in a yellow cake yet though, so I am just guessing on that application.

We have been doing a lot of comparison on different types of ingredients over the last five years or so. WE taste test things a few different ways to find out which way tastes better.

a reply to: rickymouse

Thanks for the great info! This was the first time I've made a cake (hadn't even tried baking a box cake before) so I can use all the tips I can get!

Also... those taste tests sounds fun

originally posted by: zosimov
a reply to: rickymouse

Thanks for the great info! This was the first time I've made a cake (hadn't even tried baking a box cake before) so I can use all the tips I can get!

Also... those taste tests sounds fun

We did a taste test between regular butter, European style Land of lakes butter, and grassfed butter one day, we had all three and put a little bit on crackers.

The European style and Organic grassfed were both way better than the regular butter taste wise. So, since the wife and I are just two people, we had both of my daughters test it on their kids and on their husbands, using a blind taste test meaning the kids did not know which was which with the regular and the european style butters. One daughter went further and used three kinds, the European, organic, and plain butter. Everyone picked the European butter as being better, I guess the regular organic butter my youngest daughter used did not much better than the regular butter in the taste test.

Ok, the regular butter goes on sale for between two and a half and three bucks a pound often. It normally is about three ninety a pound but there usually is one brand on sale somewhere between three bucks to three thirty a pound. The organic costs about five bucks a pound but never goes on sale. The grassfed butter is about six bucks a pound, once in a great while there is a coupon for a buck a pound off. The Land of lakes Euro butter is about five fifty a pound but a few times a year goes on sale for two ninety nine a pound. So when it goes on sale we buy lots of it, butter freezes well, the higher the fat content the better it retains it's flavor and frozen butter does not absorb flavors like refrigerator butter does from stuff in the fridge. Any butter can be frozen to preserve freshness, I was thinking of buying canned butter for emergency essentials but that is expensive, so now we just keep ten to fifteen pounds in our freezer on a rotational basis to keep it under a year old.

Double blind taste testing is good. Everyone agrees that that organic flour has less aftertaste, probably because there is no glyphosate preharvest treatment of organic flour. Regular flour never had that sharp like taste before, but the last ten years it started to have it more and more so I am thinking the glyphosate residue is causing that degradation in taste.

Maybe some people can't taste the difference, if you eat a lot of prepared food that is highly spiced, it dampens your taste buds and the food all starts to taste bland. If you eliminate that junk food full of Ummami taste and histamine loaded taste, then things start to taste better. They add that chemistry in food to get people to buy more of their food, it creates an addiction similar to drug addiction. They use other chemistries to keep people from reacting negatively to the added chemistry which can lead to metabolic intolerance and weight gain because they block some bodily enzyme functions while promoting others.

I have been studying this stuff for many years and I still cannot determine what causes what because studying interactions of added chemistry along with the chemistries of the food it self isn't tested much. The FDA does not test for cross reactions in determining safety, they do not even test for adjuvant action of the chemistry blends which can create low level toxicity. I do not know what the FDA does with all it's money it gets, I guess it just pays high priced salaries and food inspectors on site to make sure that there are some sanitary practices being used in the factories.

a reply to: rickymouse

I like Kerry butter best of all!
Though for my baking (so far), I have generally used the cheapest butter. I think if I continue baking, and as I try more complicated recipes, I will probably pay way more attention to better ingredients because I agree with you that it makes a difference.

Thanks for the advice on the flour-- I will definitely look out for Dakota Maid next time I need some!

Oh and I got a pic!

a reply to: rickymouse

I agree....Kerry is the best butter I have ever used, tasted, etc.
Even better than the local Amish butter we can get around here.

Cannot beat quality ingredients, when you can afford them.

The Kerry butter is quite expensive here, sold by the half pound. The Land of lakes one pound butter is way cheaper when getting it at half price. If we were just looking at butter for our bread or toast, I would consider getting some of the Kerry butter but it really raises the price. I think it is about five bucks for a half pound of Kerry butter here and it costs three bucks for the Land of lakes European on sale. We do a lot of baking, the pasty crusts and the butter for inside the pasties takes about a pound to make say twenty pasties. The European butter does taste a little better for that, but we usually just use cheaper butter if we don't have lots of the eu butter. For frostings the EU butter is much better tasting.

We do not buy the Euro butter unless it is on sale, I am not going to start paying over five bucks for a pound of butter. Heck, we never pay more than three fifty. I guess we are a little thrifty when it comes to stuff like that.

a reply to: rickymouse

It's not so bad around here for that....but if it was, I'd have to go wit another brand, that if for sure.
Although I would prefer one that is no hormone or organic.

It looks yummy.

a reply to: MichaelLyon

You about to spam a link?

Why havent you made an intro thread?

I added you as a friend, don't think I'll forget.