Old Fashioned Birthday Cake

Today is my Dad's Birthday...and Justin Biebers...more on that later...

To celebrate we are having dinner at The Hanna House - mom is making her signature lasagna and I am in charge of the cake.  Dad's favorite is Chocolate - so when assigned to cake duty, my mind immediately went to this incredible looking old fashioned cake recipe from Ina....Beatty's Chocolate Cake...

The recipe was easy (labeled as intermediate) but time intensive.  The big cake cutting is tonight and I will report back on the final product - I must say that the Chocolate Buttercream icing is possibly the best thing I have tasted in 2011 - the secret is the coffee flavoring - it adds tons of depth to the flavor and intensifies the buttery chocolate goodness...

Notes:
- I did not have instant coffee powder for the icing - so used my coffee grinder to grind the beans extra fine and added only about 1/2 of a tablespoon (as opposed to the recipes full tablespoon) to the hot tap water
- Of course I assumed that I had plenty of semi sweet chocolate left over from Oreo cake I made for my brother's Bon Voyage party (see post here) - but only had 4 oz instead of the 6 ounces required for the frosting - as a substitute I added two teaspoons of shortening, two teaspoons of coco powder, six tablespoons of sugar, and two extra tablespoons of butter (the chocolate turned out perfect - I also microwaved it and stirred every 30 seconds instead of heating on the oven over simmering water)
- A few folks commented on the frosting and indicated that there was not enough for the full cake - which made me nervous, therefore, I skimped on the middle layer - these comments are false - there is plenty of frosting for both the cake and hungry bakers/husbands to have a taste

Check out my work in progress pics below...

Love the old fashioned homemade look of this cake

Will take pictures of the flaming (59 candles?!?) cake and report back on the flavor - can't wait to dig in tonight!

Now - back to Bieber Birthday Fever (he turns 17 today!) - Check out his Birthday Remix with Usher below - (on behalf of The American Cancer Society - MORE BIRTHDAYS!)