Hershey's "Especially Dark" Chocolate Cake

***We recently celebrated my wonderful husband's birthday...on Jan. 2nd. We had a fantastic day and a GREAT dinner with our family and friends that night. And by now, you know that it isn't a birthday around here without a delicious, homemade birthday cake. I started asking Brad what sort of cake he wanted about a week before the big day. He took some time to think it over and finally decided on a dark chocolate cake...his favorite kind of chocolate! I remember seeing the recipe below for the perfect cake...conveniently located on the back of the Hershey's "Special Dark" cocoa package. And besides, I had already made the milk chocolate version several times with great results. You may remember THIS post from a while back, of Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake. And perfect it was!

The best (and really only) change that I made to the recipe was substituting 1 cup of freshly brewed coffee for the 1 cup of boiling water that's called for in the recipe. The result was a fabulously rich and decadent cake. If you are a coffee-lover, I highly suggest doing the same thing! It certainly wasn't over-powering...it simply added a nice flavor to the final product.***

Hershey's "Especially Dark" Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:
2 cups sugar

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup Hershey's Special Dark cocoa

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup boiling water (I substituted 1 c. hot coffee...see my notes above!)

Directions:
Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour two 9-inch round pans.

Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of electric mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin).

Pour batter into prepared pans.

Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely.

"Especially Dark" Chocolate Frosting

Ingredients:

1 stick (1/2 cup) butter

1/2 cup Hershey's Special Dark cocoa

3 cups powdered sugar

1/3 cup milk

Directions:

Melt the butter. Stir in cocoa.

Add powdered sugar alternately with milk, beating to spreading consistency.

Makes about 2 cups.

Source: Hershey's Kitchens (also on back of "Special Dark" Hershey's Cocoa package)