This past weekend we had my husband’s cousin and her daughter over for some hang out time with our kids and each other.

Now, Kira loves cake just as much as I do and is also a hobby cake decorator and baker. She has been asking me to make a raspberry chocolate cake for a while now, and every time I think “well, I have never done that before. That sounds hard!” Well, I finally looked into what goes into making a raspberry chocolate cake. I searched Google and Pinterest and my favorite baking books.

THE RECIPE
I settled on this recipe from Martha Stewart: Chocolate-Raspberry Cake and its sister recipe for icing: Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting.

I have my progress pictures below, but I will sum up my thoughts on the cake here:

1. The layers of cake come out pretty thin. My husband thought that it must be a mistake or that I did something wrong. But once you put it together, it’s quite tall enough.
2. The recipe calls for you to get the filling boiling, then cook an additional 7-8 minutes. I wasn’t sure if that meant to keep it on a boil or to lower it. It didn’t say. Since it was splattering all over the place, I lowered it down to 3-4.
3. I poured my cooked filling into a room-temperature bowl to cool. I didn’t keep it in the pot that I cooked it in.
4. Remember to let your butter and your cream cheese sit out for a little while so you can get them soft enough to make a smooth icing.
5. I didn’t save any raspberries to put on top because I thought they would get too soft and squishy while in the fridge for a day or two.
6. It will seem like there’s too much icing, but just keep layering it on. It’s worth it!

Making the filling wasn’t nearly as difficult as I thought it was going to be. It helps that I have watched cake shows where they reduced things before.

THE VERDICT 

I took the cake out of the fridge for a few hours to get room temperature, but it was still quite cold when we had it after our HEALTHY lunch of salad. I loved the cream cheese icing and the fresh raspberry filling. But the cake was kind of bland, though very moist.

BUT, once the cake got room temperature, it was very delicious! I could then taste the chocolate and the flavors of the cream cheese and cake and raspberry blended together incredibly well!

That being said, Hershey’s Perfectly Chocolate Cake is still my favorite chocolate cake recipe! But I’m not sure how well it would have went with the filling and the icing. That’s an experiment for another day.

I guess I should also add that the kids (two five-year-olds, a three-year-old and a one-year-old) weren’t sold on the cake, including the five-year-old who is a big raspberry fan. This is definitely an adult cake, especially if you use the liqueur that it calls for. I didn’t because I don’t have raspberry liqueur lying around, but I don’t doubt that it’s amazing. Using the liqueur probably really brings out the raspberry flavor even more.

And here are my pictures!

The beautiful batter:

Dividing it up into three 8″ pans:

 

Cooking the raspberries, sugar and lemon juice:
  

After cooling for a half hour, you add some uncooked raspberries:

Put half on your first cake and then put the middle on, then put the other half on:  

Let it rest like this in the refrigerator for a few hours or overnight:  
The frosting was easy to make. You weigh your semi-sweet chocolate or follow the directions on the box:

Sift together your dry ingredients:  

Melt and cool your chocolate:

Weigh out your cream cheese or follow the guides on the foil wrap:

Beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth:  

Slowly add the dry ingredients, then the sour cream, and then pour in the chocolate:
  

Then, all you have to do is ice your cake!   

Hope you enjoyed this simple baking post. Never be afraid to try new things!

Nichole