Chocolate Espresso Cake is every coffee lover's dream dessert. It has a strong espresso flavour but complements the chocolate cake's cocoa. Chocolate and coffee go together perfectly, and this cake is the best.
Preheat the oven to 350°F / 180°C and prepare two 8-inch cake pans (9-inch would work since this is a large cake recipe). Always use cake pan parchment circles. Making no-stick cakes is easy. This is useful but unnecessary without them!
2
Mix all ingredients except espresso powder and hot water in a large bowl until lump-free. Simple to mix by hand, electric mixer, or stand mixer, but I recommend a stand mixer for frosting. Start a stand mixer on low to avoid chocolate powder flying!
3
Scrape bowl sides and bottom with spatula or wooden spoon to remove dry ingredients. After smoothing chocolate mixture, dissolve espresso powder in hot water and add to cake batter.
4
Bake batter in prepared cake pans for 30–40 minutes or until a wooden skewer comes out clean. Depending on your oven, it may take longer to bake, so check with a skewer, cake tester or toothpick after 30 minutes.
5
Butter should be room-temp. Avoid splitting buttercream by maintaining the right temperature. Butter works best when removed from the fridge an hour to an hour and a half before use.
6
Mix the butter in a stand mixer bowl with a whisk attachment on medium-high speed for 5 minutes, scraping down the sides.