I feel like a bit of a fraud posting this as my nine year old niece made the entire thing herself. While I was making tea, she measured out and put together all of the ingredients with minimal intervention (apart from, you know, dealing with hot things etc) and I’m really rather proud of her for doing so. She got the recipe from here and I mean, if a kid can do it, then any old baking novice can whip this up. Onto the actual cake itself, it’s a rich and rather delicious chocolate cake with a super creamy peanut butter frosting on top. You can decorate it how you like, too – go on, chuck some more chocolate on here. Onto the recipe…
Ingredients (this makes 2 brownie pan sized cakes or 1 large 12×17 inch pan, you could half the recipe to make 1 brownie sized cake which would feed around 9-10)
For the cake:
230g (1 cup) butter
240ml (1 cup) water
42g (1/2 cup) cocoa powder
250g (2 cups) plain or all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda (bicarbonate of soda to us UK folk)
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
200g (1 cup) granulated sugar
100g (1/2 cup) light brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla (I actually didn’t add this and it was still fine!)
120ml (1/2 cup) buttermilk
For the frosting:
405g (1 and 1/2 cup) smooth/creamy peanut butter – not the natural style stuff
115g (1/2 cup) butter
360g (3 cups) icing sugar
120ml (1/2 cup) heavy cream
1 tsp vanilla
Toppings: Melted peanut butter, chopped up peanut butter cups, chocolate chips, M&M’s, any chocolate or decoration you like!
Method
Step One: Preheat oven to 177 degrees (350 F) and grease whichever tin(s) you’re using.
Step Two: Heat (medium heat) the butter, water and cocoa butter in a pan until it’s melted and smooth. Put to one side. In a large bowl, combine the flour, bicarbonate and salt together in the bowl, then pour in the butter/cocoa mix. Whisk to combine, it’ll be quite thick. In another bowl, combine the eggs, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla together, then add this to the other mix. Again, it’ll be quite thick. Add the buttermilk and mix together.
Step Three: Pour the batter into the tin(s) and bake for 15-20 mins, until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool completely before frosting.
Step Four: For the frosting: Mix together the peanut butter and normal butter together until smooth (about a minute). Add the icing sugar, heavy cream and vanilla, then mix on high for a minute until combined. If it’s too thick, add more cream, if too thin, add more icing sugar.
Step Five: Smooth on the frosting, then add whichever toppings you want! It tastes nice at room temperate or from the fridge, but just slamming your face into it works too.
So, that’s it. It seems like a lot, but it really isn’t, just a few steps to delicious peanut butter goodness. Let me know if you try this or any of the other bakes in this lil’ section right here.
Helen x
