- Today we're making one
of my favorite cakes. It's my Ultimate Chocolate Cake. And I call it Ultimate because
it's the best I've ever had. Super, like just so fluffy. It's almost not real. But it's not dry. It's really moist and chocolatey. And to balance it all off, there's this fudgey, slightly
salted chocolate buttercream that will blow your mind. And if you're thinking, "Oh,
soft, airy, like just fudgey. "Where's the contrast?" It comes in the form of these cacao nibs. Pure chocolate in it's natural form. And it's not sweet, but
it is pure chocolate. It's like all antioxidants,
so it's healthy now. And it's a good contrast
for the rest of the cake. Okay, let's get started. Three cups of all purpose flour. Two and 2/3 cups of granulated sugar. 1/2 a cup of cocoa powder. One and a 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder. A tablespoon of baking soda. 3/4 of a teaspoon of Kosher salt. Give this a whisk to distribute
all those ingredients, especially the leavening
agents and cocoa powder and then we'll set aside and
work on our wet ingredients. 3/4 cup of vegetable oil. One and a 1/2 cups of strong, hot coffee. 1/2 a cup of sour cream. Three large eggs at room temperature. One cup of buttermilk. One tablespoon of vanilla extract. And let's whisk it up. (splashing) Okay, we're gonna combine
the wet and the dry in the standing mixer fitted
with the paddle attachment and make sure to scrape the bottom down. This batter is really liquidy. You can take a look and see. It's not really thick. It makes the moistest
chocolate cake I've ever had. Don't be frightened if it
looks like it's a liquid puddle and magically turns into cake. I buttered my cake pans. And now I'm just tapping flour around to make them release really nicely. You don't want your cake
to stick in the pan. That's a disaster. I'm using a kitchen scale to make sure that each layer weighs exactly the same. I'm gonna pop on some cake strips. These are just wet fabric strips and what they do is they
slow the baking down on the outside so the
cake is nice and flat and has nice moist
edges that aren't burnt. These are gonna go into the oven at 350 for about half an hour or until the centers are set. A little bit springy, and you'll probably see
the edges pulling away from the pan. About 35 minutes later and
they're out of the oven. Smells so good. And watch this. (clanking) Perfect release. Also, that is a very nice flat layer. Perfect for decorating. Great for stacking. While my cake is baking, it's time to whip up a really easy but delicious buttercream. We're starting off with three
sticks of unsalted butter at room temperature
into our standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. And mix on low for a few
minutes until it's nice and really creamy. (mixer whirring) Take the standing mixing bowl out. Sift my sugar in, which is a pound. And then mix it. Cover with a tea towel, so we don't get a crazy toxic sugar cloud. (mixer whirring) Add a drizzle of cream. A teaspoon or two of vanilla,
just a little drizzle. (mixer whirring) I've only made a marginal mess and my buttercream is done. You can see the consistency is nice. For the chocolate
buttercream I'm adding in about two tablespoons of
high quality cocoa powder. And a quarter of a cup of melted
and cooled dark chocolate. Give it a mix, just so the
chocolate's incorporated. And it's beautiful and creamy. Then you give it a generous pinch of salt. And mix again. (mixer whirring) Good, and (lip smacking) taste's great. Right now I'm gonna fill my piping bag up with that delicious chocolate buttercream. Twist the end, and then
just snip the tip off of it. So just FYI, I've made this
cake like many many times before and I've filmed bits and pieces of it. So you might have noticed
a couple of inconsistencies if you're eagle eye watching it. But here's the deal, for the
cake, it's an eight inch, three layer cake. It's huge. On camera, for part of
it I made a six inch cake because I wanted to have
a ton of cupcakes as well. One of my favorite things
to do is take a big recipe and then just scale it down, use a smaller cake and then have cupcakes or little mini Bundt cakes
that I can serve along with it. That's kind of fun and it makes decorating
easier for some reason. But anyways (laughing), on
the video, you're gonna see for the decoration, it's an
eight inch, three layer cake. And we're starting off by
piping some buttercream onto the first layer. I'm using a cake turntable,
but it's totally optional. I just love it. It's so easy to smooth
everything out with a turntable. It makes your life a lot easier. Pipe your buttercream onto
the first layer of the cake. If you don't wanna use
a ton of piping bags, or you just wanna save
a little bit of time, go ahead and just, you know,
smear it on with a spatula. Add your second layer on. More buttercream now. And if you want to do something
that I highly recommend, add some cacao nibs on that buttercream. I didn't do it on camera, but I've had it before and
the more of those you can add, they add so much crunch and
texture, I just love it. Okay, add the third layer on
and now we're gonna pipe more buttercream onto the
top and onto the sides. I'm using a bench scraper for the sides and I'm just gonna give it a
few swipes to start out with. I might need to fill in some of the gaps with the piping bag,
or just a little knife. Keep smoothing it along. And then it's good. Now you can use an offset
spatula to smooth the top. Sometimes I'll go back
and smooth the side again to get that little corner edge right. And then I'll use an
offset spatula and pull in as I turn the cake. For a really easy decorative flourish, I'm adding a skirt of cacao
nibs to the bottom of the cake. Just take some of the
cacao nibs in your hand and press them up against the cake gently and then move along,
move along, move along. And you're done. Here's a little trick. I wanted to have more contrast, so I took some of the
extra fudge that I had and I smeared it on the
inside of the piping bag with a knife. That fudge will be forced
out of the piping bag just a little bit and give the
dollops some more definition. And they'll also be a
little bit sharper too. Sometimes butter cream
can be a bit raggedy. All right, that was really fun to make. I love that this cake
just kind of came together and had a basic skirt of those delicious
antioxidant-filled cacao nibs and a couple of dollops
and then called it a day. Didn't need extra fancy stuff, just a basic amazing chocolate cake. All right, I'm gonna
take a bite just for you, not because I've been waiting for this like the whole day, and I'll report back. (soft music) Oh my God. It's so good. If you make this cake, and
you can't get cacao nibs, go ahead and put like some bittersweet or semisweet chocolate chips, and just sprinkle them around, because the crunch is amazing. Oh my God. I can see why people are
like so into chocolate. It's just transformative
when it's really good. All right, thank you so much for watching. I really hope you get to make this recipe and you know, hit Like the button. Subscribe.
