Chocolate Mint Cake

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Can you believe I actually remembered to take a photo of my birthday cake? Of course, it only took me two weeks to get it posted with the recipe ... but better late than never (my motto as of late).

I didn't have the original recipe, which my mother says was from a Better Home & Garden cookbook. I recreated it using layers of Easy Chocolate-Buttermilk Cake and then frosted them with this.

MINT BUTTERCREAM FROSTING
From The Cake Mix Doctor. There is not a bad frosting recipe in this book. They are all homemade as opposed to the cake recipes which fix up cake mixes. I don't use the cake recipes from this, preferring the texture of home made cake, but I do use it for inspirations on cake/frosting pairings. This is the basic buttercream frosting with mint extract substituted for the vanilla.

8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter at room temperature
3-3/4 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
3-4 tablespoons milk
1/2 to 1 teaspoon peppermint extract
Green food coloring

Place the butter in a large mixing bowl. Blend with an electric mixer on low speed until fluffy, 30 seconds. Stop the machine and add the confectioners' sugar, 3 tablespoons of milk, and vanilla. Blend with the mixer on low speed until the sugar is incorporated, 1 minute. Increase the speed to medium and beat until light and fluffy, 1 minutes more. Blend in up to 1 tablespoon milk if the frosting seems too stiff. If you like, tint the frosting green ... I do like as you can see from the photo.

CHOCOLATE TOPPING
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate
1 tablespoon butter

Melt the chocolate and butter together. (The butter helps keep the chocolate malleable enough to slice when solid. I forgot to use anything but straight chocolate when I made this. It was like a rock ... tasty but rock-solid and required a serrated knife to get through the top.) Cool. Pour over the top of the frosted cake.


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