Frosting Friday

This week I hosted our Pokeno Christmas party.  We had a great time and I made this delicious cake.  I combined several ideas into one cake.  I was a little concerned that the cake would not hold together well, especially since it was a recipe that I came up with and had never tried before.  But it worked out great and everyone loved it!

Chocolate-Chocolate Chip, Cheesecake Cake with Buttercream Frosting*

*A chocolate cake with milk chocolate chips, layered with cheesecake and buttercream frosting

Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Cake

1 box devil's food cake mix

1 box Jello devil's food cake instant pudding mix

1 cup vegetable oil

1- 8 ounce container sour cream

1 cup milk

4 eggs, beaten

16 ounces milk chocolate chips

Mix cake mix, pudding mix, oil, sour cream, milk and eggs until well blended.  Then fold in chocolate chips.  Divided evenly into three greased and floured 8 inch cake pans.  Bake at 375 degrees for approximately 25 minutes.  Cool on a cooling rack.

Buttercream Frosting

2 sticks butter, softened 

4 cups powdered sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 TBSP. vanilla extract

* I had to triple the frosting to have enough, so that would be 6 sticks of butter and 12 cups of powdered sugar!!

For the cheesecake layer I bought a plain cheesecake a cut it into cubes.  You could certainly make your own, but for this recipe the store bought one was fine with me.

Assembling the Cake

Begin with a layer of cake, frost it with buttercream, then place half of the cubed cheesecake on frosted layer.  Top the cheesecake with another layer of frosting.  

Top with the second cake layer, frost the cake, top with the remaining half of the cubed cheesecake.  Top the cheesecake with a layer of frosting.

Complete with the final cake layer.  Frost the top and sides of the cake.

Because this cake has so many layers, it is best to refrigerate the cake over night before serving.  Be careful when transferring from refrigerator to serving, it is very HEAVY!

I top it with a chocolate Christmas tree.  I melted chocolate in a ziploc bag and cut a little hole to pipe the chocolate.  I drew the design on wax paper; after it dried I placed it on the cake for a festive garnish!  It was very simple, a "piece of cake!"

Enjoy, enjoy!  We sure did!