Birthday Cake Recipe: The Best Home-Made Chocolate Cake

In my bid to find the best home-made chocolate cake recipe, I baked quite a number of chocolate cakes. Thankfully, my neighbours were kind enough to help me finish off the early batches. But it was my friend, Cheryl who mentioned that Hersheys had a great chocolate cake recipe and she was right! This cake is dense, moist and rich and when freshly baked, extremely dangerous for the waistline.

Funnily enough, I have never used this recipe with Hershey's cocoa powder (ssshhh, don't tell them!). Just because I had Van Houten cocoa powder sitting in my larder the first time I baked this. This time round, I used a lovely cocoa powder carted all the way back from Italy by a friend who was there on her honeymoon. It turned out even better than I remember it to be.

I hope you try this recipe because it is really simple and can be whipped up in a jiffy.

The Best Home-Made Chocolate Cake Recipe

Ingredients:

2 cups sugar

1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa

1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda 

1 teaspoon salt

2 eggs 

1 cup milk

1/2 cup vegetable oil 

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup boiling water

Directions:

1. Grease and flour 12-cup Bundt pan (or just use a baking spray with flour in it)


2. Heat oven to 350°F or 175°C


3. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer for 2 minutes. Stir in the boiling water. The batter will be thin. Pour the batter into the prepared pan.


4. Bake 50 to 55 minutes. Cover the top of the pan with a layer of aluminium foil to prevent the bottom from burning if your oven is too hot.


5. Cool 15 minutes; remove from pan to wire rack. Cool completely.


6. Lightly sprinkle powdered sugar over the cake. (The powdered sugar helps define the edges of the bundt cake. It will disappear so be prepared to sprinkle more powdered sugar just before serving.) 


7. Decorate with birthday cake toppers.

This should make a birthday girl or boy very happy! and probably the husband too, considering how much cakes can cost nowadays.

Party Food: Focaccia Pizza Recipe

Thought I would share the recipes for the focaccia pizzas that I served at the party. It was simple enough to whip up and slightly fancier than normal catered fare. I didn't slice the focaccia in half but I think I might do that next time. The pizzas turned out nice but think a crispy focaccia pizza might be nicer but I guess it depends on whether you belong to the "thick" or "thin n crispy" camp!

Mushroom and Truffle flavoured Focaccia 

Ingredients: 

frozen focaccia (purchased from NTUC Finest)

mozarella cheese

mushroom

truffle oil

1. Brush the top of the focaccia with truffle oil.

2. Top the focaccia with the sliced mozarella cheese and sliced mushrooms.

3. Brush the top again with truffle oil.

4. Bake until the cheese has melted and the the crust has browned.

5. Remove from the oven. Slice into small squares and serve warm.

Roasted Pumpkin and Sun-Dried Tomato Focaccia

Ingredients:

frozen focaccia

mozarella cheese

roasted pumpkin

pine nuts

sundried tomato

rocket leaves (not shown in the image above cos I forgot to add them till later)

basil oil

1. Brush the top of the focaccia with basil oil.

2. Top the focaccia with the sliced mozarella cheese and roasted pumpkin and sundried tomatoes.

3. Brush the top lightly with basil oil.

4. Bake until the cheese has melted and the the crust has browned.

5. Remove from the oven. 

6. Toss some rocket leaves in balsamic vinegar and olive oil and arrange it on the pizza.

7. Slice into small squares and serve warm.

Oh and do you like how i labelled the pizzas? I stuck a little label pick into a garlic.

I love using natural props! God is one amazing creator!

A Disney Medieval Party

November is the month of birthdays because both my kids have birthdays that fall in November. I chose to do a combined party again this year with a disney medieval theme. I combined the disney theme for K with the medieval theme for J. 

I bought the mickey cut outs on etsy and made my own mini paper bunting. I made larger ones too (see image above) and decorated the house with them. These were quite simple to make. I just cut out the paper and folded it over the string and taped the paper together. Then glued the mickey cut outs on the flags. Jaeden actually helped me to stick the paper over the string while I cut the paper. It was quite a simple and fun mother and son project. 

I packed little party snack boxes for each kid and labelled each one with their name. Inside the box, there was a mickey-shaped ham and cheese sandwhich, disney cookies, trail mix consisting of sugar peanuts, mickey-shaped cheddar bites and broken up pockey sticks. The food was a hit with the kids and that kept them quiet for a short while during the party. 

I baked the cakes in a bundt tin that I bought from the US and had my sister cart it back for me to save on shipping. It was really simple. I used a chocolate cake recipe from Hersheys and a banana bundt cake recipe from Dorie Greenspan. Will post the recipes shortly. I also created simple cake decorations for their castles. Flags with the mickey cut outs and Happy Birthday banners. Jaeden had knights all around his chocolate castle and Kirby had Mickey and Minnie guarding his banana castle.

I love that Kirby managed to blow out his candle. 

Kudos to Stephen who captured such great photos of the day!

Check out Mickey in his medieval garb!

Here's a close up of the e-invite that I sent out to family and friends. We kept the party size small this year cos I wanted to attempt a party at home. I found the castle image online and used photoshop to add in the mickey images and coloured them in photoshop to match the castle. This year's party theme is blue grey and white.

Jaeden's Class Party Invites

My oldest son turns 5 in November. Here's a sneak peek at the birthday party invites! I am excited!