January 27, 2017, is a very special day!
It's Chocolate Cake Day! No matter how you feel about gratuitous food holidays, I'm pretty sure we can all agree that this is a very wonderful occasion and something that everyone should celebrate.
From light, fluffy cakes to rich, moist, heavy dark chocolate ones and everything in between, chocolate cake has always been there for us. We're going to go all out celebrating this one. Here are some of our favorite chocolate cake-inspired dessert recipes:
1. The Best Chocolate Cake Ever
People swear by this super easy recipe. What's the secret? A sprinkle of espresso powder to elevate and deepen the taste. Shh! Don't tell!
2. Chocolate Poke Cake
We can never decide if the best thing about poke cake is that you get to stab your cake repeatedly with the end of a spoon or the incredibly moist, delicious results you get with minimal effort. We'll stick with both. Both are good.
3. Chocolate Cake Batter Milkshake
This milkshake is pretty simple but super easy to change around and customize as you see fit. Any of the following mix-ins would be just smashing: caramel sauce, flavored vodka, a pinch of sea salt and/or your favorite crushed-up candy bar. Go wild!
4. Easy Dark Chocolate Truffles
Cake is perfect. Cake is life. But sometimes making it is just too much work, and you want something a little easier. Right? Enter the simple, perfect truffle that will send you straight to heaven any time you are craving something rich and smooth.
5. Five Minute Chocolate Ganache
Follow all the other recipes to your heart's content, but if you need to take a shortcut with your ganache, this is 100% the way to do it. With only two ingredients, this really doesn't get any easier. Save all that time mixing up the perfect batter … or just make ganache by itself and eat it straight out of the bowl.
6. Chocolate Lava Cake
Seriously, what's better than a chocolate lava cake? Who can resist that gooey center that oozes out when you jab your fork in? This is probably the easiest but also most foolproof/delicious version out there, so you have no reason not to get moving on this one.
7. Dark Chocolate-Caramel Cake With Gold-Dusted Chestnuts
Ok, you can leave out the edible gold dust if you must, but that's half the fun! Do try to find chestnuts, though. The sweet, starchy, earthy flavors they bring complement the cake just perfectly.
8. Sour Cream Toffee Fudge Cake
It might sound weird, but sour cream brings the perfect zippy, rich tang to this recipe, kind of like cheesecake. Once you add generous portions of thick, dark, sweet fudge and crumbled, buttery toffee, you have the perfect flavor harmony.
9. Cake Mix Fudge Crinkle Cookies
Cake cookies? Yep! This is not a drill. You seriously can make cookies (super easy ones at that) with a box of devil's food cake mix and just a few other ingredients. Bookmark these the next time you need a super quick dessert!
10. The Best Easy Cake Pops
Obviously, if you have leftover cake, this is what you need to do with it. Obviously.