As I was leaving to go on a trip awhile back, I promised my kids that when we got back we’d make a cake with Creamy Chocolate Frosting on it together and I’d let them decorate it.
I’m gonna let you in on a little secret today that most of you have already picked up on. If you want a cake or dessert to taste extra special, there is one no fail method of making sure that happens.
How To Make Your Cake Taste Better
No matter how many times you’ve made it, no matter how ordinary the recipe may seem, cakes taste better if you let kids decorate them. ~smiles~ Seriously.
For this Creamy Chocolate Frosting, use whatever cake or brownie recipe gets your zizzwheel a goin’ and then the icing is a cinch.
Now let me tell you why I love this frosting, it has to do with my dropped-on-his-head-as-a-child-husband. You see, his favorite icing (until this one) was store bought canned chocolate icing. Insert GASP here!
He actually preferred store bought icing to homemade. You see what I have to live with! 🙂
Is This Better Than Store Bought?
Well yes! Because what differentiates this recipe from the store bought kind is, of course, flavor. This frosting is absolutely exploding with chocolate. Its smooth, creamy, and causes everyone who tastes it to do a double take because by looking at it, you are expecting it to be store bought canned icing but OH NO, none of that plastic, preservative filled flavor here. This is the real deal my pretties!
Ingredients to Make An Easy Creamy Chocolate Frosting Recipe:
- Milk
Cocoa powder
- Softened butter
- Vanilla
- Powdered sugar
TIP To Make This Process MUCH Easier:
Make sure your butter is softened or this is gonna be a bear!
How To Make Homemade Creamy Chocolate Frosting Step by Step
In a large mixing bowl, place butter and cocoa powder.
TIP: How to Make This Frosting Thicker and Richer
Now if you want this to be even richer and more decadent, you can use dutch process cocoa and you’ll end up with a dark chocolate frosting rather than a milk chocolate one. Either way, you’re pretty much set!
Add a cup of confectioner’s sugar (powdered sugar, whatever you wanna call it).
Add just a bit of milk. The recipe calls for two tablespoons and I am busted here.
Lost Your Tablespoon In The Abyss of Your Drawer?
I don’t like to search for a tablespoon when I cook most of the time so I just use the cap of the milk jug and eyeball it. Two tablespoons? I figure about three caps full will do the trick. Feel free to use a tablespoon and be more accurate if you like. I’m setting a bad example but sometimes y’all need a bad example….
Mix all of that up until creamy. This is gonna be really thick. At first it will be lumpy but stick with it and it’ll get all smooth like this, although still very thick.
Add the remainder of your milk
and confectioner’s sugar
Mix that up well.
Add vanilla and mix again, until it’s all smooth, silky, creamy, and chocolaty.
Dip your finger in to taste it…oh alright dip a spoon in if you must ~rolls eyes~ but your granny just dipped a finger in.
Yeah, its good, isn’t it? Even if you don’t do that..you just HAVE to do this:
Everyone knows beaters don’t come clean unless someone licks them first!
I learned this in college, honest!
Frost your cake with this silky smooth bit of heaven.
How to Decorate A Cake With Your Chocolate Frosting
I made two small cakes in square pans because I promised the kids I’d let them decorate the cake.
I didn’t bother taking them out of the pans to make it easier for the kids to decorate (and hold for pictures).
Of course you can use anything on earth to decorate a cake but today the kids are going to use M&M’s, sprinkles, and Alpha Bit’s cereal.
I put a little of each topping in separate bowls for each child to avoid WWIII breaking out at my house…
And a little chocolate on their clothes just makes it more fun!
In the background you’ll see that I had to interrupt their game of bowling to get them to do this..
Every photo involving a four year old that is NOT out of focus is a product of divine intervention. I am convinced of this.
Brady was going for a happy faced M&M man.
Katy was going for..putting as many M&M’s on chocolate icing as I would possibly allow her to in order to eat them later.
GREAT JOB, BRADYBUG!! Looks AWESOME!
And that is my little Miss Priss, with a cake pretty as she is! Love it, Katy!!
Creamy Chocolate Frosting
- 3 C Confectioner’s Sugar powdered sugar
- 2/3 C Cocoa Powder
- 1/2 Cup one stick butter softened
- 6 T milk
- 1 tsp vanilla
-
In a large mixing bowl, place margarine, 1 C sugar, cocoa powder, and two Tablespoons of milk. Beat until mixed well and no longer lumpy. It will be thick. Add all remaining ingredients and beat until smooth and creamy.
You may also like these frosting recipes:
Red Velvet Cupcakes and Cream Cheese Frosting
Seven Minute Frosting Foolproof recipe
Rolo Cupcakes with Brown Butter Frosting
Peanut Butter Cake (From Scratch!) with PB Cream Cheese Frosting
“Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Submitted by Southern Plate reader, Jay. To submit your quote, click here!
Yum
