Chocolate Buttermilk Cake with Frosting

A moist and delicious chocolate cake made with buttermilk and cocoa powder and topped with a homemade chocolate frosting that’s plenty sweet. The frosting has a little crunch here and there from some toasted pecans. They taste so good with chocolate.

Buttermilk

With buttermilk in the batter and in the frosting, this cake makes good use of Buttermilk. Do you find that you frequently have a carton of Buttermilk at the back of the fridge that’s about to go bad? I almost always seem to.

If you make this cake and still have extra buttermilk try making Old-Fashioned Buttermilk Pie, Buttermilk Pancakes or Buttermilk Parmesan Pork Chops.

This is a simple, old-fashioned cake that is always a winner. It’s basically a Texas Sheet Cake except instead of baking it in the typical jelly roll pan (half sheet pan), I’ve made it in a 9X13-inch pan so that it is a little thicker. Chocolate Buttermilk Cake is both light and insanely rich at the same time. It’s very difficult not to go back for another bite. And another. And another. It will keep calling out your name until every last bit is gone.

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One minute, you’ll be swooning over it, professing your love. The next minute you’ll be telling it how much hate it for making you eat too much.

That’s why this cake should only be baked for a potluck or a party where there are boatloads of people and there is no chance there will be any left over.

Fudgy Frosting

The frosting is easily assembled in a saucepan and takes only a few minutes. Still warm when poured on top of the cake, it forms an absolutely irresistible fudgy layer. It’s the frosting that really makes the cake. What’s really nice about it is it just naturally spreads itself out over the cake. You only need a spatula to help even it out a little bit.

That’s my kind of cake frosting. I know there are many people who enjoy the labor intensiveness of frosting a 3-layer cake. But I’m not one of them. By that point all I’m thinking is, I want a piece of this cake. Let’s hurry this up.

How To Make

(More detailed instructions in recipe card below.)

1. Heat butter, cocoa, and water in a saucepan until butter melts.
   
2. Beat buttermilk, eggs, baking soda, and vanilla extract.
3. Gradually mix melted butter mixture into buttermilk mixture.
   
4. Combine sugar, flour, and salt. Add to buttermilk mixture. Beat until blended.
   
5. Pour into prepared pan and bake for 30 minutes.
   
6. Make the frosting and pour over cake.
   

   

   Buttermilk Substitute

   If you don’t have any buttermilk you can make a buttermilk substitute by placing a tablespoon of lemon juice or white vinegar in a glass measuring glass and filling to the 1 cup line with milk. Stir.

   Recipe Tips

   That being said, you do need to wait a little while for the frosting to cool and set up before you slice it and take a piece out, or all the frosting will run into that empty spot. Unless you stuff the empty spot with a wad of aluminum foil and tilt the pan ever so slightly to make it harder for the frosting to move in that direction. I’m not saving I’ve done that before.

   Use full-fat buttermilk.

   The pecans can be left out if you need a nut-free dessert.

   Storage

   Cake can be kept at room temperature for 4 to 5 days if wrapped well.

   

   ★★★★★
   This chocolate cake is my new favorite! It has the perfect amount of sweetness and a great texture. My only problem with this cake is that I can’t stop eating it!

   More Chocolate Cake Recipes

   • Midnight Chocolate Cake
   • Chocolate Cake with Cream Filling
   • Nutella Chocolate Cake
   • Easy Death By Chocolate Cake
   • Chocolate Praline Layer Cake

   

   Originally posted May 4, 2017.

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