A cake without frosting is like spaghetti without sauce or a hot dog without a bun. You can separate them, sure. But why would you want to? So try this recipe for your chocolate cake.
TOTAL TIME: 35 minutes
MAKES: About 2½ cups, or enough frosting for 1 (10-inch) round cake or 18 cupcakes.
Ingredients:
16 tablespoons (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
3 egg whites, at room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa, sifted
Directions:
Cut butter into tablespoons. Fill a medium saucepan with 1½ inches water, bring to a boil, and lower heat to maintain a gentle simmer.
Place egg whites, sugar, cream of tartar and salt in a metal mixing bowl. (Use the bowl of a stand mixer if you have one.) Place bowl on saucepan, making sure bottom doesn’t touch water. Whisk constantly until sugar dissolves and mixture is opaque and bubbly and reads 160-165 degrees on a candy thermometer, about 4 minutes. Remove bowl from saucepan.
Use an electric mixer with whisk attachment to beat mixture on high speed until it is white and fluffy with stand-up peaks and bowl is no longer warm, 4 minutes. With mixer running, add butter a tablespoon at a time, scraping down sides with a spatula. Beat in vanilla and cocoa until fully incorporated. If buttercream looks soupy, ingredients are too hot. Set bowl in refrigerator to cool and beat again. If it looks dense or curdled, ingredients are too cold. Put bowl back over simmering water until it starts to melt at edges. Beat until it comes back together. Frosting can be frozen in an airtight container. Bring to room temperature and beat until smooth.
—Adapted from “Simple Cake” by Odette Williams, as published in The Wall Street Journal.