This chocolate birthday cake is simple to make, tastes delicious and is perfect for decorating for a special celebration.
I hate getting questions that I can’t give a helpful answer to, so over the past few weeks I’ve been a busy bee trying to perfect my chocolate cake recipe. Now this couldn’t be just any old chocolate cake, it had to be perfect for a birthday which meant it…
I get a lot of comments on my all-in-one vanilla sponge birthday cake and the ones that always makes me smile the most are when people say that they never bake and the simplicity of the recipe has given them the confidence to do more in future. I wanted this chocolate cake to be that simple to make… a cake even the novice-est of cooks can make.
This cake is so simple… chuck it all in and mix it up. The only piece of culinary skill you need is a bit of grating!
2) Must be suitable for decorating
When I make birthday cakes for my boys I love to go to town on the decoration (you can see some on my cakes in my cake gallery). In order for the cake to work as a decorated cake it can’t dome too much on top or sink in the middle and it must be sturdy enough to be carved into various shapes for decorating without crumbling.
3) Be chocolatey
This is actually the big reason I’ve not been able to recommend chocolate cake recipes until now. All the cakes I’d made in the past with the right texture (see point 2) used just cocoa powder and they simply weren’t chocolatey enough. To give this cake some extra chocolate-iness it includes lots of actual chocolate grated into the cake mix alongside the cocoa powder.
Photographing this cake caused a lot of confusion in my house as I decided it needed to be decorated just like a birthday cake with lots of colourful fondant. Josh (who’s 3) kept asking whose birthday it was and then started getting all excited about Father Christmas coming (because apparently, he delivers presents for birthdays too). I probably didn’t help matters by deciding to light the candles – a completely unnecessary step as I really only wanted to photograph the inside of the cake after they’d been blown out – we had fun doing it together though 🙂
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Chocolate Birthday Cake
INGREDIENTS
- 200 g self-raising flour
- 40 g cocoa powder
- 230 g caster sugar
- 4 large eggs
- 230 g soft margarine - you can also use softened unsalted butter too
- ¼ tsp vanilla extract
- 100 g milk chocolate - choose something from the baking aisle in the supermarket as it will cope well with the heat in the oven without going grainy.
- 2 tsp milk
INSTRUCTIONS
- Pre-heat your oven to 160ºC/140ºC fan.
- Line your tins (2x 20cm sandwich tins) with liners or greaseproof paper.
- Grate the milk chocolate (100g).
- Put all of the ingredients into a large bowl (200g self-raising flour, 40g cocoa powder, 230g caster sugar, 4 large eggs, 230g soft margarine, ¼ tsp vanilla extract, 2 tsp milk and the grated chocolate) mix on a low speed until fully combined.
- Divide the mixture evenly between the two tins and spread it out so it’s pretty even (it doesn’t have to be perfect as it’ll even out in the oven, but roughly flat is good).
- Put the tins in the oven and cook for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes put a skewer in the middle and check if it comes out clean. If it does it’s done, if not pop it back in for a couple more minutes and check again.
- Once cooked, remove the cakes from the oven and leave them to cool in the tins for 10 minutes.
- After 10 minutes, remove the cakes from their tins and pop them onto a wire rack to cool completely before decorating.
NOTES
NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION
Free From/Suitable For…
- Suitable for Vegetarians
- Nut-Free
The ingredients for this recipe are easily available free from all these allergens. However, please ensure you double-check allergen information for all ingredients.
Paula Woodford says
Hi I made this cake for my grandsons birthday and it tasted delicious but when I cut it it went a bit crumbly.. I would like to make this again because everyone enjoyed it but can u give me any tips to prevent this happening
Charlotte Oates says
A couple of ideas spring to mind…
* If the cake was a little overdone this could make it crumbly. Try testing it a few minutes earlier next time.
* What size eggs did you use? The recipe recommends large eggs and using medium will give a crumblier sponge. It’s possible if you used large eggs that they were on the smaller size (as they can vary quite a lot).
Jo leach says
CAn you use dark chocolate instead of milk?
Charlotte Oates says
Yes, it works just as well with dark if that’s what you prefer.
Rachel says
Grating the chocolate was frustratingly difficult. The cake smells great and I left it to cool but when I took it out the baking dish later it totally crumbled and sank. Not sure what I did wrong.
Charlotte Oates says
I’m sorry to hear that. Did the skewer come out clean when you checked the cake? It sounds like it may have been underdone if it collapsed.
If you decide to give it another try in future, you can melt the chocolate rather than grating it if you find that easier. Melt the chocolate first and the set it aside to cool to room temperature before adding it to the other ingredients.
Kim says
Hello can i leave out the grated chocolate.
Charlotte Oates says
You can, but the cake won’t taste as good as a lot of the chocolatey flavour comes from the grated chocolate. You can melt it and then mix it in when it’s cooled to room temperature if you prefer.
Kim says
Am using a 4inch and 6inch cake tins about 4inch deep how long would they need to be baked for x
Charlotte Oates says
Deep tins take about 50 minutes.
Naheela says
I made this cake over the weekend, so i baked it on sat and decorated it sunday for Monday. The sponge went dry. What could i have done wrong?
Charlotte Oates says
There are two possibilities that are most likely – either it wasn’t stored in the airtight container, or the sponge was cooked a little too long in the oven. Both would cause the sponge to go dry.
Ruth Gallagher says
I used this recipe for my son’s birthday this week and it was stunning! So easy and so delicious. Thank you so much for sharing and making it so easy to scale up.
Tina Wizard says
Hi there, first time chocolate birthday cake novice baker here.
I’d like to make a two tier 9inch and 7inch cake. I will be using deep single 3 inch deep tins rather than sandwich tins.
Q1 – will this cake stack?
Q2 – will your cake converter work for deep 3inch cake Tins
Q3 – how long would you bake them for?
Thanks in advance for my possibly very daft questions.
Charlotte Oates says
1) Yes, the cake will stack. I’d recommend using dowling/straws in the bottom tier to add some extra support to the upper tier.
2) Yes, simply put the ingredients for 2-layers into one tin. However, I find I get best results if I bake them in single layers as the cakes will rise better and cook more evenly.
3) If you do decide to bake the cakes in deep tins, they’ll take 45-50 minutes.
Suzie says
Cracking recipe! Daughters birthday cake a huge success, nicest choc cake I’ve ever had. I used bourneville choc, 2 deep tins for 4 layer cake, used the calculator, came out perfectly. Needed bit longer in oven so used foil to stop top catching. Brilliant for fondant, rises nice and flat. You’re an absolute cake genius!
Jenny Pearson says
Hi, I would like to make a chocolate orange cake, can I substitute the vanilla essence with grated orange zest and/or juice from the orange.
Many thanks
Jenny
Charlotte Oates says
The best way to adapt the cake would be to replace the vanilla extract with orange extract. I’ve tried orange zest and it doesn’t give quite the same chocolate orange flavour as extract/oil. I would recommend about 1.25 tsp of extract to really ensure the orange flavour comes through.
Jennifer Webb says
Absolutely gorgeous rich chocolate birthday cake . Held it’s shape but didn’t dry out. This will definately be my go to recipe..made cupcakes with the left over ingredients as I made double and they are just heavenly with the butter cream! Thank you Charlotte x