Claire’s Famous Chocolate Cake

Last updated on March 11th, 2025

Delicious tray bake Chocolate Cake that is decadent and moist. The icing is melt in your mouth and the recipe is quick and easy to make.

You know when a recipe makes its way into your kitchen and it’s titled “Claire’s Famous Chocolate Cake” or Susan’s or Mary’s or Jenny’s or Barbara’s or Betty’s then you know, you just know, you’re dealing with something high-level. Something stellar. Revere the recipe with someone’s name on it. The piece of paper carrying those specific instructions feels sacred and I must say when some of the writing on my copy of “Claire’s Famous Chocolate Cake” got smudged, I did experience a mini kind of baker’s panic. Thereafter, I quickly typed the recipe into Evernote. Imagine I should need Claire’s famous recipe for chocolate cake and it should not be readable! So…. here it is for all of us to enjoy, smudge free!

You will see the recipe asks you to simmer some ingredients and then add those ingredients to the other ingredients – I wondered if all those steps were necessary, so, one day I was feeling up for a little experimentation and I popped alllll the ingredients into one bowl, mixed it up and baked it. Yes, I skipped the simmering/melting butter part and guess what? The cake STILL turned out good. So basically what I am trying to say is that the cake is Famous for a reason. It’s just good any which way! So why not keep with the simplified method then? Well, I think the melting butter step adds fractional magic and I’m all in for additional steps that add magical yet marginal improvements after all. But, if one was feeling lazy to wash extra dishes Which happens from time to time right?), you know you could just bomb it all together in one bowl, mix and bake. Experiment with it. You will certainly be making this cake more than once in your life. I’m telling ya!

Claire’s Famous Chocolate Cake

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• Author: Louise Sanders

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Description

Delicious tray bake Chocolate Cake that is decadent and moist. The icing is melt in your mouth and the recipe is quick and easy to make.

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Ingredients

Cake

• 2 cups flour
• 1 3/4 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup butter (115g)
• 1/4 cup cocoa
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 cup yoghurt
• 2 eggs, slightly beaten
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Icing:

• 1/2 cup butter
• 2 tablespoons cocoa
• 2 tablespoons yoghurt
• 1 1/2 cups icing sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla essence

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Instructions

1. Add sugar and flour in a bowl
2. In a saucepan, bring the butter, cocoa, oil and water to a gentle simmer. Mix well and then remove from heat and place in the bowl with the sugar and flour.
3. Now add the yoghurt and mix through. Then add the eggs, baking soda, baking powder and vanilla essence. Mix gently here – don’t beat or overmix. Using an electric mixer, you need only mix until everything is well combined.
4. Pour into a greased baking tray or rectangular casserole dish and bake at 180°C for 30-35 mins or until a wooden skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean
5. Once cooked allow to cool before adding the icing.
6. To make the icing, bring the butter, cocoa and yoghurt to a gentle simmer, mix well and then remove from heat. Add the icing sugar and vanilla essence and mix until smooth .
7. Pour over the cake whilst icing is still hot. (do not reheat the icing as it will likely form crystals and hard bits which won’t taste so great!)
8. Decorate and savor each mouthful!