A beautiful layered cake perfect for Christmas! Four layers of cake are made with chocolate cake batter made from scratch. Peppermint butter cream frosting is made with butter, cream and powdered sugar. Crushed peppermint candies and red food coloring are mixed with part of the frosting for between the layers. Moist chocolate cake layered with red peppermint frosting and covered with snow white frosting is the final result of this recipe.
Course
Dessert
Cuisine
Southern
Keyword
Cake
Prep Time30minutes
Cook Time35minutes
Cooling Time1hour10minutes
Total Time1hour5minutes
Servings12people
Ingredients
Cake:
Shortening
Parchment
2cupsgranulated sugar
2cups(9 oz) AP flour
1tspbaking soda
½tspsalt
8oz(1 cup) unsalted butter
¼cupunsweetened dark cocoa
1cupwater
3ozbittersweet chocolatechopped
½cupbuttermilk
2large eggslightly beaten
1tspvanilla extract
Peppermint Buttercream Frosting:
12oz(1 ½ cups) unsalted butter, softened
8cupspowdered sugarsifted
1tspvanilla extract
½tsppeppermint extract
⅛tspsalt
¼cupheavy cream
½cupcrushed peppermint stick candies
2drops red liquid food coloring
Instructions
Make the cake:
Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease 2 (8 inch) cake pans with shortening. Line the pans with parchment paper; grease the parchment paper and dust with flour.
Combine the granulated sugar, flour, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Bring the butter, cocoa and 1 cup water to a boil in a small saucepan over medium-high heat, whisking often until butter melts. Add the chocolate, whisking until melted. Whisk the butter mixture into the flour mixture until blended. Add the buttermilk, eggs and vanilla; whisk until blended. Pour the batter into the prepared pans.
Bake at 350 F for 30 to 35 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire racks 10 minutes. Remove from pans. Cool completely on wire racks (about 1 hour). Cut the layers in half horizontally.
Make the frosting:
Beat the butter at medium speed with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add the powdered sugar, beating at low speed until blended. Beat in the vanilla, peppermint extract and salt. Add the cream; beat at medium speed 1 minute or until smooth. Transfer 2 ¼ cups of the frosting to a bowl. Stir in the crushed peppermint candies and red food coloring; spread ¾ cup tinted frosting between layers. Spread the remaining 3 ¼ cups white frosting on top and sides of cake.
Recipe Notes
I use 4 pans instead of 2 pans, so I do not have to try to cut the pans evenly horizontally. If you use 4 pans, pour 1 ¼ cup + 2 tbsp batter into each pan. Bake the pans for 30 minutes, rotating in the oven every 10 minutes.