My Favourite Chocolate Cake

Updated: August 2, 2013

Attention chocolate lovers! This moist cake is the best -- especially topped with the chocolate glaze! It’s actually low in fat but you’d never know it!

This is a very easy cake to whip up if company pops by unexpectedly. Or if you just have a craving for chocolate cake! The applesauce greatly decreases the fat content in this recipe which in turn should decrease your guilt about eating chocolate cake! I've also been out of plain unsweetened applesauce and have used apple-strawberry applesauce in it's place and couldn't tell the difference. When out of an ingredient, improvise!

1 cup Buttermilk (see Note below)
½ cup Unsweetened applesauce
1/3 cup Vegetable oil
1 Large egg
1 tsp Vanilla
1 cup Flour
1 cup Sugar
½ cup Cocoa
1 tsp Baking soda

Glaze
1 cup Icing sugar
2 tbsp Cocoa
1 tbsp Corn syrup
1 tbsp Hot water

Optional Garnish
Smarties candies, chopped or cake sprinkles

Note: Instead of buttermilk you can substitute 1 cup of milk + 1 tbsp. white vinegar.  Let sit for 5 minutes or until chunky looking.

Preheat oven to 350F. Spray a 9-inch round spring form pan with vegetable cooking spray. Or, if using a 9-inch round baking pan, trace the bottom of the pan on a piece of parchment paper.  Cut out the circle of parchment; place it in the pan and spray paper with cooking spray.  Set aside.

In a small bowl, combine buttermilk, applesauce, oil, egg and vanilla. Mix well and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, cocoa and baking soda. Stir to break up lumps. Add buttermilk mixture; whisk until smooth, about 1 minute. Pour batter into prepared pan.

Bake for approximately 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack for 20 minutes.  Your cake should look something like this delicious little fella!

Run a knife (or, I prefer a plastic stone scraper from Pampered Chef) along the sides of the pan. Loosen sides and turn cake onto a plate. {Remove parchment paper circle, if used}

Before cake completely cools, prepare glaze. In a double boiler over simmering water, stir together glaze ingredients until sugar dissolves. Add 1 tbsp of hot water if glaze seems too thick. Pour over warm cake. Garnish with chopped Smarties or cake sprinkles, if desired.  Let stand for 30 minutes until icing hardens. 

Tip: Adding the icing while the cake is still warm makes it so much easier to spread the icing evenly without damaging the cake.

From: “Healthy Meals in Minutes” recipe cards (#20)