Cake Paramedic

I'm not a big fan of chocolate cake mix. Don't get me wrong! I LOVE chocolate but I find the boxed mixes of chocolate cake to be less than full of rich chocolate flavor. So what do you do when the kiddos want chocolate cake and you just don't want to go all out and make a cake from scratch?

Have you heard of that Cake Doctor lady? She takes boxed mixes and throws out the directions and does what she wants with them? I thought maybe I could do something similar. I have some yellow cake mixes. I usually like them quite a bit. Maybe I could fix one up a little. Make it chocolaty. I could apply Box Mix First Aid. I could be a Cake Paramedic!

I started out with this cake mix. It's one of those you put butter in. I like butter. I wasn't thrilled when I made one following the instructions so why not mess with it a little?

Throw it in the bowl!

I needed to make it chocolaty so cocoa powder seemed the only thing to do. I used "dutched" cocoa powder but I'm thinking you can use "natural" too. Cocoa powder is naturally acidic. It's also naturally bitter! No wonder we love chocolate! Your average chocolate dessert hits all our buttons!

Mix them together! If I was a careful baker I would have gotten out a sifter of some sort and sifted out all those lumps. I'm not though. So I just sat there with a whisk stirring it around. Eventually it became mixed and relatively lump free.

Now for the butter! Just one stick. It's practically a diet recipe.  Melt it in the microwave for a minute.

Throw a cup of chocolate chips in the hot melted butter. It's a match made in heaven! Give them a stir. They'll melt if you're patient. Just give them a stir every once in a while. You know between whisking the cake mix, signing assignment books, pouring drinks for the kids, stepping on the cat.

See how well it melted? Did you know that chocolate doesn't like heat? It has all sorts of heat sensitive chemicals in it and the longer its heated the more flavor it loses? So treat your chocolate delicately!

Now you know all cakes need some liquid so since I wanted more chocolate flavor I went for a cup of coffee. Coffee makes chocolate taste chocolatier. This coffee is a little weak but I'm flying by the seat of my pants here. Instant coffee would be FINE for this. If you keep such an abomination around your home. Here is a transcript from a conversation I had with my son his senior year.

Mom: What is happening to the instant coffee? I'm practically out!

Big Boy: Ahhh, uhm, . . .

Mom: Are you drinking it?

Big Boy: Well . . . yes . . .

Mom: Why would you think to drink it?

Big Boy: Well . . . it's . . . coffee . . .

Mom: It's not for drinking! It's for baking!

Big Boy:  . . . baking?

Mom: Of course, it's for baking! What could you be thinking? Why would you do that?

Big Boy: Huh? What? It has instructions . . . on the side . . . for drinking . . .

Mom: So, now you chose to "read the instructions", where is this coming from? Are you on drugs?

Big Boy: Huh? NO! I just want coffee before school . . .

Mom: Caffeine! You're doing caffeine! You ARE ON DRUGS!

He's getting ready to go into the Air Force. I fully expect him to comment on what a reasonable, kind person his drill sergeant is . . .

Eggs! We need eggs for a cake!

Mix the eggs with the coffee. You want your coffee as cool as possible. No steaming hot coffee here please!

Pour the egg and coffee mixture in the cake mix-cocoa mixture. Stir them up!

Now pour the chocolate-butter mixture to your batter. It's getting delicious looking!

Stir it up until it's smooth. Now did you remember to preheat your oven to 325 deg F.?

Butter a 9X13 dish.

Pour the batter in and spread it out. Doesn't it look pretty?

Bake it and give it a test after 30 minutes. Mine was done! If a toothpick comes out wet let it go for 5 more minutes. Just keep checking.

I decided I needed to check out the cake and make sure its okay before my daughter frosted it. She just put on some canned chocolate frosting we had. It was one of the "whipped" varieties.

Oh my! It is so good! So chocolaty! Deeply chocolaty! Very moist and tender too!

I may never make it from scratch again!

Chocolate Cake: from a yellow mix

1 yellow cake mix
2/3 cup cocoa powder
1 stick of unsalted butter
1 cup dark chocolate chips
1 cup of coffee, cooled
3 large eggs

Preheat oven to 325 deg F. Butter 9X13 cake pan. Mix cake mix and cocoa powder together. Melt butter and add chocolate chips to it. Stir chips until melted. Mix eggs into coffee until well blended. Stir coffee-egg mixture into cake mix-cocoa mixture. Add chocolate-butter mixture and mix until smooth. Spread into pan and bake for 30-40 minutes. Cool and frost.