Spring Fling

We have an annual Spring Fling at work which is basically our company picnic. It's a day of volleyball, ping pong, barbecue, door prizes, visiting with our co-workers, etc. We always have a bake-off also and this year's category was chocolate cake. I realize now that I could never compete in a real bake-off as I am hypercritical and want things to be 'just right'. This is my 'go-to' recipe for chocolate cake. I started out making it a 3-layer cake. That looked atrocious and was very lop-sided. So I scrapped that and decided to make it in my heart-shaped pan which I have done before (see here). This one stuck to the pan. It was about midnight by now and I decided to heck with it, but I could not sleep so got up and made this AGAIN like the picture above. Well, all efforts paid off as I won FIRST PLACE!! Yeah! I won a gift card to a grocery store. It was a fun day for sure.

SPRING FLING CHOCOLATE CAKE

1-3/4 cups flour
2 cups granulated sugar
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup oil
2 eggs
1 cup whole milk (I used buttermilk this time)
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup boiling water
1/2 cup toasted almond slices

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and dust with cocoa a 9 x 13 pan. Set aside. In a large bowl, combine sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Stir until blended. Add eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla and beat will until combined, about 2 minutes. While beating, heat water to boiling. Stir water into cake batter and stir well.

Pour the thin batter into the prepared pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes. Cool 5 minutes then remove from pan and cool completely on wire rack.

Frosting:
1/2 cup butter
2/3 cup cocoa powder
4-1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/3 to 1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

In a saucepan, melt together butter and cocoa. Stir until smooth. Using a mixer, alternately beat in powdered sugar and milk until frosting is smooth and creamy. Stir in vanilla. Frost cake as desired. Garnish with toasted almonds.