A cake to sweeten up the Toddler's day

photo courtesy of the Husband

Last week was a stressful one for us. The Toddler was sick for 5 days (he never got sick for more than 3 days!). It was a hellish week! It all started Saturday early morning. He got a fever of 39°C so we stayed at home hoping it was just the usual fever. But on the night of the third day his fever was still 39°C and up! So we rushed him to the E.R. Good news was that all his tests were normal and it was possibly just a flu that will last 4-5 days. And it did! By the morning of the fifth day he was no longer sick. Thank God!

I remembered that on the morning we rushed him to the E.R., upon waking up, the Toddler said, "Mom, I'm hungry... Hmm I know let's eat cake!". He really didn't have any appetite during the whole ordeal and here he was saying he was hungry. It broke my heart to tell my kid that we didn't have any. So I called the Husband and asked him to buy a cake before going home from work. When Husband got home, he was so excited to give the Toddler his cake but the kid just wasn't in the mood any more. His fever was on the rise again. So I promised to bake one when he gets well.

To fulfil that promise, today I surveyed my baking pantry and found out that I still have lots of cocoa tablets, Hershey's cocoa powder, semi sweet chips and a baking chocolate bar. So it's chocolate cake time. I used Hershey's Perfect Chocolate Cake recipe but I had to halve all ingredients so I can make a small cake. Also, since I wanted to use my cocoa tablets I used Jun's blog chocolate cake recipe as a guide to the amount or ratio of cocoa powder and tablea in the recipe.

The cake turned out really good. Not overly sugary sweet coma inducing kind of cake. The cocoa tablea taste was there, albeit very mild. And the cake was just enough for us three to consume for the entire weekend. The best part of that day:  upon seeing the cake, the Toddler stood on the chair and excitedly dove his hands into cake and licked his fingers saying, "I love cakes!". Cakes really do make the ouchies go away.

photo courtesy of the Husband

Chocolate Cakelette
adapted from Hershey's Perfect Chocolate Cake
   1 cup sugar
   1/2 cup + 6 tbsp flour
   3 tablea crushed to powder form
   2 tbsp + 2 tsp Hershey's cocoa powder
   3/4 tsp baking soda
   3/4 tsp baking powder
   1/2 tsp salt
   1 egg
   1/2 cup milk
   1/4 cup oil
   1 tsp vanilla extract
   1/2 boiling water

Instructions:
   1. Pre-heat oven at 180°C and grease and flour 2 6" round cake pan. Line with parchment paper.
   2. Sift together in a large bowl the sugar, flour, cocoa powder, cocoa tablea powder, baking powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Mix well.
   3. Then add oil, milk, eggs (beat the eggs in a separate bowl before adding to the mixture),and vanilla extract. Then using a hand-mixer or stand mixer, mix in everything for a minute or two.
   4. Add in the boiled water and mix well until everything is incorporated.
   5. Pour batter into the pans.
   6. Bake for 30-35 mins or until toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean.
   7. Cool for 10 mins in pan. Then transfer to wire rack and cool completely. Frost the cake

Chocolate Buttercream frosting
Yield 1 cup
   1/4 cup butter melted
   1/3 cup Hershey's cocoa powder
   1 1/2 cup.powdered sugar
   6 tbsp milk
   1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions:
   1. Stir in the cocoa powder with the melted butter with a hand-held mixer or stand mixer.
   2. Add the powdered sugar and milk in batches. Alternating from sugar and milk and ending it with the sugar. Mix.
   3. Add in vanilla extract and mix until well incorporated.
   4. Add powdered sugar if necessary.