Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Buttercream Icing

Is there anything quite as wonderful as chocolate cake? Does it take you back to happy childhood memories? I love chocolate cake, but the cake in the picture was made at the request of my grandpa. For his 84th birthday, he said he wanted chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream icing, so being a good granddaughter, I went in search of an amazing recipe to try. I must admit... I found it. The Best Chocolate Cake Recipe (Ever) and Classic Buttercream Frosting, both found on Pinterest, were the recipes I decided on to try, and the result was fantastic! I ended up making this cake again for one of the Soldier's I work with for his birthday, but he wanted chocolate icing instead. The results were equally as delicious! One of these days I may try this cake with the chocolate icing recipe used on the original blog, but here's the recipes I used for this cake...

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
¾ cup cocoa
2 teaspoons baking powder
1½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon espresso powder
1 cup milk
½ cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water

Preheat oven to 350º F. Prepare two 9-inch cake pans by spraying with baking spray or buttering and lightly flouring.

Note: Espresso powder can be purchased at a specialty store, or you can do what I did. Buy instant espresso, and use a mortar and pestle to grind it into a powder. It works great.

Add flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, salt and espresso powder to a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Whisk through to combine or, using your paddle attachment, stir through flour mixture until combined well.

Add milk, vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla to flour mixture and mix together on medium speed until well combined. Reduce speed and carefully add boiling water to the cake batter. Beat on high speed for about 1 minute to add air to the batter.

Distribute cake batter evenly between the two prepared cake pans. Bake for 30-35 minutes, until a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes, remove from the pan and cool completely.

Vanilla Buttercream Icing

1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks or ½ pound), softened
3-4 cups confectioners (powdered) sugar, SIFTED
¼ teaspoon table salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
up to 4 tablespoons milk or heavy cream

Beat butter for a few minutes with a mixer with the paddle attachment on medium speed. Add 3 cups of powdered sugar and turn your mixer on the lowest speed (so the sugar doesn’t blow everywhere) until the sugar has been incorporated with the butter. Increase mixer speed to medium and add vanilla extract, salt, and 2 tablespoons of milk/cream and beat for 3 minutes. If your frosting needs a more stiff consistency, add remaining sugar. If your frosting needs to be thinned out, add remaining milk 1 tablespoons at a time.