One year on my birthday, I made my own birthday cake. I made this Sour Cream Chocolate Cake from one recipe in my Scientifically Sweet Chocolate cookbook and it is so soft and moist and plush. Here's the story of this cake that's pictured. I jazzed it up with a chocolate cream cheese frosting, fresh cherries and sprinkles. It was incredible, it was moist, creamy, chocolatey, simple to make. After frosting and sprinkling my sour cream chocolate cake, and then grating dark chocolate all over it like a pile of snow I set it in the fridge before I went to bed. On that eve of my birthday my mom must have summoned an urge to put her mark on it so as to make it look like I didn't do ALL of the work (guilt, maybe?). What do you know, when I woke up to pull the cake out to the table I saw a mess of PURPLE (my favorite color) and red hearts spewed all over it. Nice touch. Mom might need to work on that steady hand.

She thought it would be a grand surprise and I thought "who ruined my cake?". This is what Moms are for. To make you laugh and feel like a child again. In case you can't read scribble, it says "Happy Birthday Chia". Chia is my family nickname and I had it way way way before people started eating it.

My birthday cake of choice is moist and packed with chocolate flavor from both dark chocolate and cocoa. Sour cream complements the natural acidity of chocolate and balances the sugar.

STEP BY STEP INSTRUCTIONS FOR SOUR CREAM CHOCOLATE CAKE

STEP 1). First we make the liquid chocolate concoction by combining chopped dark chocolate, boiling water and sour cream into a smooth pudding-like mixture. Be sure to whisk the chocolate and hot water first until melted and smooth to let the water cool down before stirring in the sour cream otherwise you might get some curdled milk protein. Curdled milk protein is not in this recipe.
STEP 2). Next up, get the dry ingredients together. Sift flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt into a bowl and blend well.
STEP 3). Now the all-familiar creaming stage. You might expect me to say cream for 5 minutes until very pale and fluffy, but I won't. There is such a thing as over-creaming. It can actually lead to a dry cake! Adding so much air into the batter might make it fluffy but also dry. Think about crisp sugar cookies - the more you cream the butter and sugar, the crispier the cookie because of all that air that's built in.
STEP 4). For this cake, just cream for 2 minutes or so until the butter and sugar are smooth and lightened by a shade. Beat in vanilla and eggs until evenly combined and the mixture is soft and pillowy. Then begin adding the flour mixture alternately with the liquid chocolate mixture in about 3 stages, mixing on low between additions, until the batter is smooth.
STEP 5). Ready, set, BAKE! This cake will bubble and puff as it bakes and then will shrink slightly on cooling so you should be left with more-or-less even layers.

HOW TO MAKE CHOCOLATE CREAM CHEESE FROSTING

This will blow your mind - it has NO BUTTER! And it is incredible! This is a souped up cream cheese frosting, delicately sweetened with a pile of whipped fresh cream folded in. From the fridge this frosting actually feels like ice cream. You are so welcome.