This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy.
Yellow Cake with Chocolate Frosting
The BEST Yellow Cake Recipe with Milk Chocolate Frosting. 5-Star Rated Recipe!
I was one of those kids that were counting down the minutes at my birthday party until I could blow out the candles and eat my big ol birthday cake. I wanted a piece with a thick layer of homemade chocolate frosting.
This is literally the best yellow cake recipe. It is so flavorful, moist, and buttery! The homemade chocolate frosting is insanely rich and creamy and pairs perfectly with the homemade yellow cake.
It’s New Year’s Eve so let’s go out of 2016 with a huge yellow cake with chocolate buttercream because I see only green smoothies in my future….
If you read my last post about making a homemade yellow cake — Homemade Yellow Butter Cake, I went through many experiments to bring you these cake recipes. My pants just got tighter in an effort to bring you the perfect cake!
We had large cake testings to determine the winners of the unofficial homemade yellow cake recipe challenge.
The path to the Yellow Birthday Cake with Milk Chocolate Frosting…
The recipe that I posted a few days ago is for a traditional yellow butter cake. I wanted to change it up a little and experiment with adding in some vanilla pudding mix. Since it is known to add a good amount of moisture to a cake, I was excited to see how it would affect the final product.
It not only made a denser, moister cake but also a flavorful one as well. It’s a small amount of pudding but was still a big difference-maker. This is truly THE BEST YELLOW CAKE EVER.
The chocolate buttercream recipe is one that I played with over the years and is now my go-to recipe. It has the perfect balance of rich chocolate, butter, and powdered sugar and isn’t over the top sweet. It truly is the greatest chocolate frosting. If you are a chocolate cake lover, you must try my Love at First Sight Chocolate Cake.
Add some colorful sprinkles to this Yellow Birthday Cake with Milk Chocolate Frosting if you want to make kids really happy.
Here are my favorite baking pans — USA Bakeware Round Cake Pan 8 inch and USA Bakeware Round Cake Pan 9 inch.
A Wilton Angled Icing Spatula is the perfect tool to use to frost this cake.
Pin this now to find it later
Pin It
Yellow Birthday Cake with Milk Chocolate Frosting
Equipment
Ingredients
- 4 Large Eggs
- 2/3 cup Whole Milk or Buttermilk
- 1 teaspoon Vanilla
- 2 1/4 cups Flour
- 1 1/2 cups Sugar
- 2 teaspoons Baking Powder
- 3/4 teaspoon Salt
- 1 cup Butter softened, cut into cubes
- 2 Tablespoons Oil
- 1/3 cup Vanilla Pudding Mix instant
Chocolate Buttercream Frosting:
- 1 1/2 cups Butter softened
- 1 cup Cocoa
- 5 cups Powdered Sugar
- 1/3 cup Cream Half n Half or Milk
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- In a small bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, and vanilla.
- In a standing mixer, stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.
- Beat the butter into the flour mixture, one cube at a time. Continue to beat until it resembles coarse crumbs.
- Add the 1/2 of the egg-milk mixture and oil and beat the batter is light and fluffy. Add remaining egg-milk mixture and vanilla pudding and mix just until combined.
- Take a spatula and scrape the sides of the bowl.
- Spread into greased 8 or 9-inch cake pans and smooth tops with a spatula.
- Bake for 16-22 minutes, depending on the depth of pans. If the cake layers are thin, they will cook for less time than the thicker layers.
- Let cakes cool. Run a knife around edge of cake pan and flip over. Frost with milk chocolate frosting.
- To make Chocolate Buttercream Frosting:
- In mixing bowl, cream together butter, cocoa, powdered Sugar, and cream until light and fluffy. You may want to add more cream or milk depending on consistency. Once the cake has cooled and has been removed from pans, frost each layer with frosting.
- Top with chocolate shavings, chocolate chips, sprinkles, M & M's or whatever your heart desires.
Video
Notes
- This recipe makes two 9-inch cake layers or three 8-inch cake layers. If you use three 8-inch cake pans, the layers will be thinner and will cook for less time.
- This is one baked good that gets even better the next day, if covered.
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Happy Baking, my friends! xo
Hello! What would you say is the biggest difference between this and your butter cake? Taste, texture, effect on the wasteline?????
I made your butter cake a few months ago sndvtvwas amazing!
Hi Sarah! Haha! They both will affect the waistline but it doesn’t stop me. 🙂 I would say the biggest difference is this recipe calls for pudding mix in it which creates a moister texture. I hope that helps!
This is my first made from scratch cake and man it turned out great!!! My wife and daughter loved it. My mom couldn’t even believe that I made this and she’s been baking for decades! It was so moist and tasty that I’m ready to start making another one. Thanks so much for the recipe!
Woo hoo! Way to go, Brandon! I love to hear about success in the kitchen. That is amazing and oh so impressive. Thanks for taking the time to write such a kind comment.
Do you use self rising or all purpose flour?
Hi Allison! I use all-purpose flour. 🙂
This recipe is to die for. Thank you so much. I making cupcakes for a party and this recipe is perfect.
I am so glad you loved it, Sher! Thank you for taking the time to comment. I appreciate it!
So I did it in 3 9in pans (because that’s what I had in hand) and baked for 16 minutes and they were perfect!
Oh, I just saw this comment, Rachel! Yay…so glad to hear it!
I tried to bake it in 2 8in pans and it never baked all the way in the middle. Even with added time. Do you think it would be better would 2 9in pans? Going to try again with 3 8in pans.
Hi Rachel! I like to use three 9 inch pans as it is easier for the cakes to be thoroughly cooked throughout and there are more layers of frosting, which is always a good thing. Give it a shot with 3 – 9-inch pans or if you use the two 8 inch pans, you can cover the edges with foil or a pie cover to allow the middle to become fully cooked. Hope that helps!
Hi! I have 3 9-inch pans in the oven…. how long would you recommend baking them for?
Hello! I made this cake a couple of weeks ago and was VERY impressed with the overall flavor. Best yelllw cake recipe I’ve come across so far! I’m going to make it again this weekend but I was going to try it with buttermilk instead of whole milk. So my question to you is, do you change or modify any of the other ingredients when you use buttermilk or does everything stay the same? Also, is there a noticeable difference in taste when using buttermilk versus whole milk? I read somewhere that using buttermilk will definitely make a cake more moist but it may add a “tang” to the flavor so I was wondering what your observations were on this. Thanks!
Hi Liz! I love these types of questions because this is what I love to do. I have experimented a lot with buttermilk in baked goods and I am a huge fan! I have made this cake with both whole milk and buttermilk and both have turned out fabulous. Buttermilk does make baked goods extra moist. There is a tang to buttermilk but it is not as noticeable once it is baked and with the pudding flavor being in it as well, I don’t think you would notice it much. I would be interested to hear how you like it compared to using whole milk. I hope that helps! Thanks for the kind compliment. 🙂 – Melissa
Thank you so much for this great recipe!
I live in London, however, so had to make my own instant vanilla pudding as it doesn’t really exist here (I found a recipe online). I also used vegetable instead of canola oil. The overall taste was delicious, but the cake was a little dense and didn’t rise quite as much as I expected. If I left out the pudding mix – or used half the amount – and added a bit more baking powder, do you think it would it be a slightly fluffier cake and rise a bit more?
The icing – while tasting delicious – had an odd, grainy texture. I wonder if it’s because I didn’t allow the butter to soften enough?
Thank you very much!
Hi Emily! Thanks for visiting from London! My brother and his wife lived there for years and they would tell me how they couldn’t get the same products as in the United States so I completely understand. I love how you improvised and were super creative in the kitchen. You can leave out the pudding. The pudding does make it more moist so I would suggest adding 1 Tablespoon more oil and 1/2 teaspoon more baking powder. Hope that helps! The frosting shouldn’t be grainy at all…it should be smooth as silk. I am wondering if the butter needed to be at room temperature to incorporate into the powdered sugar. Thanks for trying out the recipe and have a great day! 🙂 – Melissa
Thanks so much for your reply, Melissa! I made it again for my daughter’s birthday party, this time with great success. I actually kept in the pudding, but reduced it by half and added 1/2 tsp more baking powder and a bit more oil. It rose more and the flavour was delicious. For the icing, I left the butter out for 24hrs so it would be at room temperature – TA DA! Smooth as silk icing. All the kids loved it. Success! Many thanks again 🙂
Do you have to have a stand up mixer??
Hi Scotty! If you don’t have one, it is no problem. Do you have beaters by chance? If not, you can do everything by hand but it will take a little more time…and muscle. 🙂 I hope that helps! Thanks for trying out my recipe. -Melissa
Im so anxious to try this recipe for my friends day.They say”Cook to a mans heart,how about bake?”.What size box of pudding do I use?