This blackberry chocolate cake is the best chocolate cake I’ve ever made. Maybe even tasted. I don’t know, it’s been awhile since I’ve bought chocolate cake. Cheesecake Factory has kind of been my gold standard for chocolate cake. I’m not sure if that will fare will with my audience….but I low key love cheesecake factory. Even though I can only take a few bites at a time because it’s so rich.
But I’m happy to report I finally have made a chocolate cake that’s just as rich and dense and moist and so beautifully chocolatey. I have achieved a chocolate cake that I can only take a few bites of at a time before collapsing into a sugar coma. It took a lot of experimenting from a lot of popular recipes such as Salt Fat Acid Heat, Once Upon a Chef, and Sally’s Baking Addicton.
Even better yet, this chocolate cake has fruit incorporated both in and around it! Summer is right around the corner and I try to incorporate fruit into almost all of my baking. So I decided to incorporate blackberry into this chocolate cake.
The layers are infused with a homemade blackberry simple syrup and covered in blackberry mascarpone whipped cream frosting.
Tips for a great blackberry chocolate cake
A few important things to note:
- You must start with room temperature ingredients. Room temperature ingredients mix together better than cold ingredients. In the past I have definitely been lazy about letting my milk and sour cream come to room temperature. I’m not making that mistake anymore. This was the least domed I’ve ever had a cake turn out. Doming is natural, but too much doming makes your cake bake very unevenly. This results in a dry cake.
- Once you see the tops of the cake look set, start checking for doneness. Usually cakes need another 5-10 minutes once you see that dome form. When I’m making a cake for the first time, I check for that dome and quickly open the oven and give the pan a quick push. If the batter jiggles, it’s not ready.
- Let the cakes fully cool before frosting. Or else your frosting will melt! Also while the cakes are cooling, there is still steam inside of the sponge. If you cut it too soon, that steam will escape and leave you with a drier cake. Leave them to cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Then remove them and cool on a cooling rack for 30 minutes.
I hope you enjoy this chocolate blackberry cake as much as I did! If you’re looking to try a different summer cake, how about my balsamic strawberries and cream vanilla cake?
Blackberry Chocolate Cake with Blackberry Mascarpone Frosting
Ingredients
For the cake
- 2 cups (260g) all-purpose flour
- 3/4 cup (65g) unsweetened natural cocoa powder
- 1 3/4 cups sugar
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup sour cream, at room temperature
- 1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee
For the blackbery syrup
- 1 cup fresh blackberries
- 1/2 cup water
- 1/2 cup sugar
For the mascarpone frosting
- 8 oz mascarpone cheese
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar (or to taste)
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 15 blackberries
Instructions
Make the cake
- Prehat oven to 350°F. Grease the bottoms of either two 8 inch pans or 3 6 inch pans and line with parchment paper. Grease the parchment paper and sides of the pan.
- In a medium bowl, mix the flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
- In a large bowl, whisk the vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla until combined. Add the buttermilk and sour cream.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. Gently whisk until combined.
- Whisk in the hot coffee. Pour the batter into the prepared pans.
- Bake for about 26 minutes for 8 inch pans, 20 minutes for 6 inch pans, or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs. Let sit in pans for 10 minutes, then remove and let cool on a cooling rack for 30 minutes.
Make the blackberry syrup
- In a small saucepan over medium heat, add the blackberries, water, and sugar.
- Once the sugar has dissolved, smash the blackberries with a potato masher.
- Turn off the heat and let sit for 10 minutes.
- Strain the syrup through a fine mesh strainer to remove the seeds and berry skins.
Make the mascarpone frosting
- Using a mixer on medium speed, whip the mascarpone and heavy cream until it has soft peaks.
- Add the powdered sugar and vanilla.
- Whip until the mixture has stiff peaks.
- Smash the blackberries in a small bowl, fold them into the mixture with all their juices.
Assemble
- Trim the domes off the cooled cake.
- Using a pastry brush, brush the simple syrup onto each cake layer.
- Spread some of the frosting between each cake layer. Stack the layers on top of each other.
- Spread frosting on the whole cake. Top with blackberries.