One Bowl Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing

"Julia Child never lost her temper just because something boiled over, or collapsed in the oven, or just plain fell through."

So I heard a couple of times as I watched Julie and Julia while I baked my sister's birthday cake. I tried to remember this when the cake which was supposed to be able to make four cake layers came out of the oven flat as a tack (turns out the recipe called for a 12cm cake tin...not 12 inch....note to self: read the recipe properly next time!), and then when some of it stuck to the bottom of the tin when I turned it out. So I said to myself 'Breathe..... Julia Child wouldn't lose her temper....' and started again....

I do have a tendency to panic a lot when things go wrong with my cooking. And most of the time it's unwarranted, whatever has gone wrong is fixable and I end up feeling silly for reacting like that. I guess it's something for me to work on, and I thought I did really well when things went wrong with the first cake I made. It really helped remembering those words from the movie, so maybe I need to make them my personal mantra for when things go wrong in the future! :)

The second time around I made the one bowl chocolate cake that I'd made back here for my brother in law's birthday. I remembered that it had turned out well, and tasted delicious so I had high hopes that it would turn out for me again. And it did, with the icing being as divine as last time! Seriously, I can't say enough about how amazing this icing is. I mean cream cheese? Melted chocolate? Nuff said! 

One Bowl Chocolate Cake
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cup buttermilk
3/4 cup warm water
3 tbsp vegetable oil
1 tsp vanilla
Icing
2 1/4 cups icing sugar
1/4 cup cocoa powder
Pinch of salt
170g cream cheese, room temperature
190g unsalted butter, softened
255g bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled slightly
3/4 cup sour cream
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Butter two cake tins and dust with cocoa. In the bowl of an electric mixer sift the cocoa, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Beat on low until just combined. Add the eggs, buttermilk, water, oil and vanilla, and raise the speed of the mixer to medium. Beat until smooth, about 3 minutes.
2. Divide the batter between your two pans. Bake for 35 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centres comes out clean. Allow cakes to cool for 15 minutes before turning out onto wire racks. Allow to cool completely.
3. To make the icing, sift the icing sugar, cocoa and salt together. Beat the cream cheese and butter using an electric mixer, on medium-high speed, until smooth. Reduce the mixer to a medium-low speed, and gradually add the sugar-cocoa mix. Beat until combined. Pour in the melted chocolate in a slow, steady stream. Then add in the sour cream and beat until combined.
4. If you need to cut the top off the cake that will be the bottom layer, so the top is flat. Spread the chocolate icing over the top of this layer and place the other cake on top. Use the rest of the icing to ice the top and sides of the cake.

Recipe Source:
One Bowl Chocolate Cake
from Martha Stewart