Do you ever dream in cake? Or ice cream and cookies for that matter? No? That’s just me? Okay well you should start.

You see a few weeks ago I received my latest Enjoy package from Joy the Baker. It was a collection of goodies from King Arthur flour, including a gift card and catalog for future use.

Remember this? The catalog was littered with recipes involving its products and there amongst the pages was a black forest cake. It was a good looking cake that is for sure. I instantly began dreaming about making it.

For some reason I didn’t get around to it until this past weekend. I felt like I needed more of a reason then just because I felt like it, to make such a grand cake, so when a dinner at my parents house came up I seized the opportunity.

This cake is amazing. It’s simple, and it looks fancy. And I didn’t even try that hard. My cake was uneven, not level and still oh so pretty. I started this cake when I woke up and it was 100% complete by noon, with very minimal time and effort. I dare say this may have been the best cake I have made to date. I used the recipe in the King Arthur catalog for inspiration and kind of just ran from there.

Use quality ingredients when you make this cake, I promise it makes all the difference.

Black Forest Cake

Inspired by this recipe

Ingredients

1 cup Double-Dutch Dark Cocoa or Dutch-process cocoa
2 cups cake flour
1/2 cup white whole wheat flour
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups water
2/3 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 large eggs

Filling:
16 ounces cherry raspberry pie filling
3 cups heavy cream
1/4 cup confectioners sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 ounces grated dark chocolate

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two 9 inch cake pans.

2. Make the cake: In a medium bowl mix the cocoa, flours, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

3. In the bowl of a mixer combine the water, oil and vanilla. Slowly add the dry ingredients. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Divide evenly among cake pans and bake for 30 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool completely. Transfer to refrigerator until cold.

3. Make the filling: Whip cream to medium peaks. Add confectioners sugar and vanilla and beat to stiff peaks. Divide the cream in half, you will use half for the filling and half for the frosting.

4. Cut each cake in half, resulting in four layers. Spread 1/3 of the pie filling on first layer. Top with 1/3 of filling whipped cream. Top with remaining layers of cake, pie filling and cream until assembled. Frost entire cake with remaining whipped cream. Top with grated chocolate. Cake will keep for up to five days wrapped tightly in the refrigerator.