Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake

I hope you had a wonderful 4th of July!  My sister’s birthday is July 3, so my Mom and I baked her this delicious Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake covered in fondant.  Many of you probably already know this, but I can’t stand the taste and/or smell of mayonnaise; it literally makes me gag!  But this chocolate mayonnaise cake is my Mom’s recipe that she has been making for years.  You can’t taste the mayonnaise in it; if anything, it makes the cake super moist and delicious.  We layered 4, 9″ cakes with frosting in between each layer.  We then covered the entire cake in frosting and fondant.  We made a batch of Rice Krispy treats, cut out star shapes with a cookie cutter, and then covered the stars with fondant.  Sorry there aren’t any pictures of the inside of the cake; we transported it to my sister’s and ate it!  Hope you enjoy!

Ingredients:

• 3 cups flour
• 2/3 cup cocoa
• 2 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 cup hot water
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease and flour 2, 9″ cake pans.
2. In a small bowl, sift flour, cocoa, baking powder, and baking soda.  Set aside.
3. In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the mayonnaise, sugar, water, and vanilla until combined.  Add the dry ingredients and beat until smooth.
4. Divide batter between cake pans and bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick insterted in the middle comes out clean.
5. Remove pans from oven and allow to cool 10 minutes.  Remove cakes from pans and allow to cool on a wire rack.
6. Frost cakes with Vanilla Buttercream when completely cooled.

Yield: 2, 9″ cakes

Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:

• 1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks or 1/2 pound), softened (but not melted!) Ideal texture should be like ice cream.
• 3-4 cups confectioners (powdered) sugar, SIFTED
• 1/4 teaspoon table salt
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• up to 4 tablespoons milk or heavy cream

Directions:

1. Beat butter for a few minutes with a mixer with the paddle attachment on medium speed. Add 3 cups of powdered sugar and turn your mixer on the lowest speed (so the sugar doesn’t blow everywhere) until the sugar has been incorporated with the butter.
2. Increase mixer speed to medium and add vanilla extract, salt, and 2 tablespoons of milk/cream and beat for 3 minutes. If your frosting needs a more stiff consistency, add remaining sugar. If your frosting needs to be thinned out, add remaining milk 1 tablespoons at a time.   Yield: 2.5 cups