Chocolate Bunny Cake

This is similar to the white coconut version I make just about every year for Easter - but I made it chocolate this time and decorated with swirly buttercream frosting instead of the candy decorations I usually do. I love this version and think it's going to be my new standard bunny cake. We are going to be on the road this Easter, so I made this guy early - in time for you to make it for your Easter gathering.

Bake 2 9" round layer cakes using whatever flavor cake you want - I doctored a white cake mix with an extra egg, substituted milk and melted butter for the water and oil, dash of vanilla. Bake according to package directions and cool completely.

Meanwhile make chocolate buttercream frosting. In a large mixing bowl cream the butter then slowly add the other ingredients. Go easy adding the milk, monitoring how much you need to get the right  frosting consistency.

• 1 stick softened butter
• 4 cups powdered sugar
• 2/3 cup cocoa powder
• pinch of salt
• approx. 3 tablespoons milk

Once the cakes are cool place one round on a large platter. Cut the second one into three pieces following this highly professional drawing (I should have taken a picture when I cut the cake, oops) and put the ears in place on top of the round head:

I didn't have a platter big enough to add his usual bowtie, but if you do then just fit the middle leftover piece of cake (after you cut out the ears) under his head and frost along with the rest of the cake. 

Frost the sides and top of the cake before adding the swirls - I didn't frost the top first and could see bare cake thru the swirls, easy fix by adding dots and smaller swirls of frosting in the blank spaces. If I had frosted the top first it wouldn't have been necessary to fill the gaps. I like how it turned out tho with the different swirly textures. Create the swirls by putting the frosting in a decorator bag fitted with a tip, I played around with a few different sized openings to get the multiple textures. It would also be pretty to just frost using a spoon to create swoops and swirls so don't let it scare you from making this if you don't have tips and all that!

 I finished it with a few colorful sprinkles around the edges of the ears and along the very bottom of the cake - totally not necessary I just don't know when to stop ;)

4.10.18: prosciutto-wrapped mozzarella sticks
4.10.17: how to make paper umbrellas
4.10.16: oven steamed salmon


Happy moment ~ yellow tulips

Fudgy Chocolate Frosting

Made this cake for a birthday party - the request was for vanilla cake with chocolate frosting. Well I've done lots of that before and wanted to try something different; came across this old recipe from 2/2008 Better Homes and Gardens in my "to try" file and and decided it was time to see if it's a good variation on chocolate frosting...and it is! This will move to my recipe folder for sure, it's a keeper.

Fudgy Frosting

In large pan over low heat melt and stir one 12-oz pkg. semisweet chocolate pieces and 1/2 cup butter. Cool 10 minutes. Stir in 8-oz carton sour cream. Stir in 4 1/2 cups (1 lb) sifted powdered sugar; stir until smooth. Makes 4 cups.

I frosted a doctored up white cake mix with this frosting and it's really rich, thick, heavy, dense (all those kinds of words - I guess that's why they named it "fudgy"!). It's so rich and dense it almost seems like you could roll it in balls and make truffles out of it. So good...if you like chocolate that is, 'cuz it's super chocolatey haha.

For the cake: add 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract to a white cake mix, substitute melted butter for the oil, and use milk instead of water. It makes a difference, you'll see! Oh, and I sprinkled a little sugar on the tops of the cake batter before baking to help them not crown in the middle so much - it works to help keep the layers flat so you don't have to trim them before frosting. This combination of cake and frosting was super easy to frost too, not many crumbs and the frosting spread easily.

served with a side of vanilla and chocolate ice cream - see how even and
 flat the layers are? sprinkling sugar on the batter before baking really helps with that.