The BEST Chocolate Cake Recipe

Several years ago, one of my lifetime best girlfriends drove out to the midwest (where I lived for 8 years) to visit me, along with her husband David and their tiny son Caleb.  By the time they finished their day-long ride in the car, Gracy was ready for something delicious to take the edge off all those fast-food and sandwich-type meals that they'd been eating.  Once Caleb was put to bed, and David was settled in with my husband James playing video games, Gracy and I headed to the kitchen, where she asked me, "Where do you keep your chocolate?"

Yeah, she's that kind of friend...one who knows a) that I've always got chocolate in the house, both for daily consumptions and for emergencies, and b) that I love her enough to share my best stuff with her!

So I answered, as all good chocoholics would, "Do you want solid, liquid, or powder?"
To which she answered, "Powder?  Seriously?"
To which I answered, "Yep.  It gets cold here, so I've got some Godiva Hot Chocolate Mix in the pantry!"

I share that story to explain that I take chocolate very seriously.  It's probably my all-time favorite food, and I've tried so many kinds that I could never count them.  I will spend a lot more time talking about chocolate on this blog, but for now, I'm going to share my favorite chocolate cake recipe.  I made one this past week for my husband to take to work, and that night while he was on call, he found a piece sitting in the call room at the hospital, where he works as a radiology resident physician.  The piece of cake had been sitting out for about 7 hours, and was stale, but he ate it anyway and said it was awesome.  It's THAT good.

Here it is, in a picture of four different cakes I made for a wedding shower.  Obviously, it's the first one on the left, and it's DARK chocolate.  I love pairing it with a white buttercream icing, but soon I'm going to try it with a chocolate icing, too, just to see how that goes.

Here's the recipe:

The BEST Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:
1 package of devil's food cake mix (I like Pillsbury, but others are probably fine)
2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup whole milk
1/3 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs (I use extra large eggs, but large would probably be fine)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Place a rack in the center of the oven and preheat to 350 and spray two 9-inch round pans with baking spray.  Put all ingredients into a mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, and mix for 1 minute on low. Stop the mixer and scrape the bowl with a spatula, then mix again on medium for two minutes.  Divide the batter between the two prepared pans and bake side by side for about half an hour, until a toothpick comes out clean.  Rotate the pans halfway to ensure that they bake evenly.  (Yes, seriously.  Just trust me.)  Let the cakes cool in the pans on wire racks for ten minutes, and then turn them out of the pans, right side up, to cool completely on the wire racks.

Final Step:  Load on the frosting!!!  I use an awesome frosting recipe that I borrowed another blogger, and I will share that very soon in another post.  Meanwhile, just use whatever type you like, and enjoy!