The ULTIMATE chocolate birthday cake!

This time of year is a pretty busy one for our family aside from the normal swimming meets, indoor track practice, and valentine's day we also have birthdays.  40% of our family have February birthdays, within 5 days.... okay so it sounds more impressive when you break it down into percentages, ha ha! :)  In all reality 2 out of our family of 5 have February birthdays. Our eldest and myself, yep 5 days apart.... his, then mine.  But this year was a special year... an 18th birthday!  And what did we do to celebrate?  He spent the night at a friend's after the basketball game and then spent the day after lazing about.  We had DiGiorno pizza (per his request), breadsticks, Vanilla Coke, and the most divinely, decadent chocolate cake.  Remember these vegan cupcakes? Well I made the cake version. and it is simply stunning!

 (it was cloudy and grey the day I baked it... so we waited..... to photograph it.  now it is sunny buy windy!  you should have seen the cloth flying... so this was taken on the run!)

Now about baking this cake... 

-mix just like you would for cupcakes

-pour batter into 2 9" round cake pans that have been well greased & lined with parchment paper

-bake for an additional 10 to 15 minutes.

-prick center of cake with toothpick to check for doneness.. toothpick should come out clean.

-allow to sit for 5 minutes before removing from pan. (run knife around edge to loosen edges.)

-center filling is a portion of the frosting lightening with real whipping cream.  (I did it to preference)

We topped the cake with raspberries and a drizzle of (canned) "whipped" cream around the edges.  The "whipped" cream ran but made a lovely design.

This cake is rich and delicious (and our 18 year old ate some for breakfast this morning with a glass of milk and a banana! it is that good!!)