Strawberries – Karen in the Kitchen

Chocolate, strawberries, pink frosting……….enough said!

What little girl doesn’t like chocolate cake? My daughter is no exception. Really though, she’ll eat a shoe if it’s covered in chocolate! One of her favorite fruits is strawberries, so it was a no-brainer to make her a chocolate cake with strawberries for her birthday. And of course she had to have pink whipped cream frosting to tie it all together.

There is one thing I must make you aware of when you go to make this chocolate cake recipe. First of all it’s the one on back of the Hershey’s cocoa box, so how can you go wrong? Here’s the warning: the batter is very, very, super duper thin!!! At the end, you add into the batter, one cup of boiling water. It kind of looks like chocolate soup.

When I first made this cake, I thought I had read the recipe wrong. It’s not! Don’t be scared, it’s all good.

I won’t lie, this cake took a while to make. I did, however plan ahead. I made the cake a day in advance then I prepped the strawberries and whipped cream frosting and assembled the cake on the day of the party. This made my life so much easier and I didn’t have a mountain of dishes to tackle afterwards.

This is my go-to chocolate cake recipe. I love pairing the sweet rich cake with this light whipped cream frosting. It doesn’t overpower the cake with lots of sugar either. The fluffiness of the frosting also allows your mouth to enjoy the feel of the spongy chocolate cake and luscious strawberries inside.

Moist Chocolate Cake

from Hershey’s Kitchens

2 cups sugar

1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup HERSHEY’S Unsweetened 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

Whipped Cream Frosting

1 cup heavy cream

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon confectioners’ sugar

red food coloring

Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking 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 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.

Whipped Cream

In a large bowl, whip cream until stiff peaks are just about to form. Beat in vanilla and sugar until peaks form. Make sure not to over-beat, cream will then become lumpy and butter-like. Add in 3 drops of red food coloring and beat until color is distributed.

I love how this pictures really makes me stop and look at every little seed on the surface of this strawberry. So amazing, like there was some kind of divine being who created it, huh? 🙂

Do you really need a recipe for this, I mean really?! Okay, get some strawberries, get some chocolate, melt the chocolate, dip the strawberries…..voila – chocolate dipped strawberries!!

I love this idea I came up with on my own, promise. I didn’t google it or anything! I had some cupcake boxes lying around from another baking project and of course I always have cupcake liners on hand. The size of these monstrous strawberries were perfect for the box. So, there you go……the perfect dozen chocolate strawberries.

These were a gift for the office ladies at my kids’ elementary school. It was staff appreciation day and they sure felt appreciated when they saw these. I love when people ask me, “Where did you buy these?”