Last updated on May 4th, 2024 at 07:50 pm
If you’re looking for the ultimate indulgence, you’ve stumbled upon the perfect recipe. Today, I’m going to show you how to create a show-stopping Chocolate Layer Cake with Bailey’s-Flavored Frosting that will leave your taste buds dancing with delight. Whether it’s a special occasion or just a craving for something sweet, this cake is the answer to all your chocolatey dreams.
The best part is: The cake base for this cake comes from a box mix! I’m all about simplifying when possible. Keep reading to learn how to turn your cake from a box into a beautiful, baked work of art.
Tools Needed to Make this Cake:
Note: This post here has more details on how to decorate this kind of cake the easiest way possible.
To make your cake layering as easy as possible, I would say you need a cake leveler for sure. You want your layers nice and flat so your cake doesn’t tip over.
You will also need some parchment paper cut in circles the size of your round cake pans. If you don’t use parchment paper, you’re risking your cake rounds sticking to the pan, and then falling to pieces when you try to take them out. My “cheap” hack is, I just use regular parchment paper, and trace a light circle in pencil around my pans on the parchment paper. Then, I use scissors to cut them out. You can also buy parchment paper that is pre-cut into circles.
I would also recommend a cake board, a piping bag with a round tip, and a flat icing spatula, and a flat scraper. All of these tools will help you put frosting between the layers of your cake most easily.
Some optional tools would be a cake stand and a lazy suzy to turn your cake. These aren’t deal-breakers, but they do make decorating a lot easier!
Patience is Key
To be perfectly honest with you, decorating a layered cake does take time! Perhaps a more skilled and less clumsy person than myself could get through this process faster. However, for me, it took about an hour of patient work to get the frosting on this cake. And that was active work time. You also have to let the cake chill for a little in the fridge between certain steps.
I’m going to break the decorating portion of this post into two parts: Absolutely bare minimum cake frosting, and “fancy” cake frosting. The “fancy” part is what took me about an hour of active work time. If you go for the bare minimum, you can get away with 30 minutes to decorate your layered cake.
If you feel like you don’t have the time or patience for this process (Which I totally get!), I would suggest just making cupcakes and piping on the frosting with a Wilton 1M tip. It will still look elegant and taste terrific, but it will save you time and effort!
Non-Alcohol Flavors to Try
Please note, this frosting uses real Bailey’s with real alcohol, and this is not one of those scenarios where the alcohol will be baked out in the end. Thus, you may want to consider this if serving this cake to minors or others who should not consume alcohol. If that is your case, here are a few non-alcoholic frosting flavors to consider:
Peanut Butter Frosting: This one’s my absolute favorite! Chocolate cake with peanut butter icing is a classic for sure. Creamy peanut butter frosting is rich and nutty, ideal for topping off chocolate or banana cakes.
Raspberry Buttercream: Fresh raspberry puree added into a buttercream frosting creates a vibrant, fruity topping. If you want to learn how to incorporate raspberries into your buttercream frosting, check out my post here about adding real fruit flavors to frosting.
Now, let’s get back to our star of the day: Chocolate Layer Cake with Bailey’s-Flavored Frosting!
How to Make Chocolate Layer Cake with Bailey’s Flavored Frosting
Ingredients:
For the Chocolate Cake:
– 1 chocolate cake mix from a box (I used Duncan Hines)
– Coffee (Replace the water in the instructions on your boxed cake mix with coffee. Mine called for 1 cup.)
– Oil (However much your boxed cake mix says to use)
– Eggs (However much your boxed cake mix says to use)
For the Bailey’s Flavored Frosting:
– 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
– 4 cups powdered sugar
– ½ cup Bailey’s Irish Cream
– A pinch of salt
Extra Fancy Decorations Ingredients:
-½ cup heavy whipping cream
-1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
-2 Tbsp Bailey’s
-½ recipe of the Bailey’s frosting from above (½ cup softened butter, 2 cups powdered sugar, ½ cup Baileys, pinch of salt)
Video Showing How to Make and Decorate Chocolate Cake with Bailey’s Frosting:
Instructions:
For the Chocolate Cake:
Preheat your oven to 350°F (Or whatever temperature your boxed cake mix says to use). Grease and flour three 8-inch round cake pans. You can use 9-inch rounds, but your layers will be pretty thin. You could consider using about 1.5 boxed cake mixes if you want to use bigger cake rounds.
Prepare your boxed cake mix according to the instructions, but replace the water with coffee. Trust me!! The coffee really brings out the chocolate flavor, and will suit the Bailey’s too. Just make sure you let your coffee cool down to room temperature if you’re using eggs!
Divide up your batter evenly between 3 cake pans that are greased and lined with parchment paper. I only have 2 round cake pans, so I greased and lined those 2 and then set out an empty bowl. I used a ½ cup measuring cup and poured a ½ cup of batter into each pan and then the bowl, going around again and again until all the batter was used up. Then, when the other cake rounds were baked and full cooled, I took the batter from the bowl and baked that.
Bake for 20-22 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. You can also look at the instructions on your boxed mix for this. Most mixes include times for 2 rounds, not 3 so you might have to shorten the time a little because your rounds will have less batter.
Allow the cakes to cool completely in the pans.
When cooled completely, carefully turn upside down onto a flat plate. If you used parchment paper and greased your pan, they should slide out easily. They will be fragile, so be careful when handling them.
For the Bailey’s Flavored Frosting
Place all the frosting ingredients together in a large mixing bowl. With an electric hand mixer or a stand mixer, beat until the frosting is well combined and has a silky texture.
Basic Cake Assembly:
**Please Note: This Post has more details on how I decorated this particular cake. I couldn’t fit all the details in this post, so I made a separate post on how to decorate a semi-naked cake (which is what this is, but I just call it “lazy cake decorating”)
Once you have your cake rounds cooled and frosting prepared, place some frosting in a piping bag with a plain round tip.
Level your cake rounds using a cake leveler
In the middle of your cake board, make a little dollop of frosting. This will be the “glue” that holds your bottom cake round in place.
Place your bottom cake round on top of the dollop of frosting on your cake board.
On your bottom cake round, trace a circle of frosting around the edge. Then, make a kind of spiral going inwards with frosting.
Using your offset icing spatula, smooth the frosting out into an even layer on top of the cake round. I ended up using a little bit extra frosting from the bowl for this, actually, because I didn’t make my spiral tight enough!
Pro Tip: Try not to press too hard down on your spatula, because you’ll mess up the cake underneath. You want your spatula to only graze the top of the frosting.
Once you have a flat, even layer of icing on your bottom cake round, place your middle cake round on top of it.
Repeat the same process of making a circle with the frosting around the edge of your middle cake round, and then filling in the circle with more icing until you have a flat, even layer of frosting.
Place your top cake round on top. Repeat the same process until you have an even layer of frosting on top of your cake round.
Pipe straight lines of frosting down the side of your cake in even intervals all around it. Then, holding your scraper lightly against the side of the cake, scrape the frosting into a very thin, even layer around the outside. Using a lazy susan to help turn the cake while you hold the scraper steady works very well for this!
When you are done you will be able to see the sides of your cake through the frosting. This is what we call a semi-naked cake.
Take a breath! You did it! That’s the simple, but elegant way to decorate a cake. If you would like a fancier version, please keep reading.
For Fancy Decoration:
Put your semi-naked cake in the fridge for an hour or 2 to chill before moving on to the fancy decorations.
Make Bailey’s infused chocolate ganache:
Place heavy whipping cream and chocolate chips in a microwaveable bowl.
Microwave in 30 second increments, stirring after each time in the microwave until your chocolate chips are completely melted (I only had to microwave twice for mine, but it depends on the strength of your microwave!)
Stir your chocolate chips and cream until it forms a thick, even mixture.
Add Bailey’s and stir again until it is incorporated fully.
Using a spoon, carefully drop some ganache into the center of the top of your cake. Using a flat icing spatula, spread the ganache out into an even layer. You want to start with a small amount in the middle and spread out. Then, gradually add more and more ganache and keep spreading until it starts dripping down the sides of the cake.
I didn’t use all of my ganache, actually, but I used most of it.
Stick the cake back in the fridge for another 30 minutes or so until the ganache sets.
Make another ½ portion of the Bailey’s frosting from above. Put in a piping bag with a star tip (I used the Wilton 4B tip). Pipe small circles of frosting around the top edge of your cake.
Stick back in the fridge for at least an hour until everything sets.
Admire and enjoy!
So, there you have it, a decadent Chocolate Layer Cake with Bailey’s-Flavored Frosting that’s sure to impress your taste buds and anyone lucky enough to have a slice. Remember those pro tips for a perfect cake, and don’t hesitate to explore other frosting flavors to match your cravings. Happy baking!
Chocolate Layer Cake with Bailey's Frosting
Ingredients
Chocolate Cake
- 1 box chocolate cake mix I used Duncan Hines
- 1 cup coffee, room temperature Use in place of water per the instructions on your cake mix
- 3 eggs Or however many your cake mix calls for
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil Or whatever your cake mix calls for
Bailey's Flavored Frosting
- 1 cup butter, softened
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- 1/2 cup Bailey's
- 1 pinch salt
Bailey's Infused Ganache (Optional)
- 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
- 2 Tbsp Bailey's
Extra Bailey's Frosting for Decoration (Optional)
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 1/4 cup Bailey's
- 1 pinch salt
Instructions
To Bake Cake
- Grease and line with parchment paper 3 cake rounds (Or however many cake pans you have, and bake in rounds so you have 3 layers total)
- Prepare your boxed cake mix according to the instructions. Replace any water with room-temperature coffee.
- Divide your batter evenly between 3 cake rounds (Or set aside extra batter if you don't have 3 cake rounds. You want 3 layers in the end)
- Bake according to the instructions on your cake mix box. When a toothpick inserted comes out cleanly, it's done.
- Let cake round cool completely! Carefully, flip the cake round upside down
Basic Cake Frosting and Decoration
- Put all frosting ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Using an electric hand mixer or a stand mixer, beat all ingredients until smooth.
- Put frosting in a piping bag with a plain circle tip.
- Place a dollop of frosting in the middle of your cake board and lay down your first cake layer.
- Put a flat, even layer of frosting on top of your second round (See above for detailed instructions)
- Place your second cake round on top of the first one. Add another flat, even layer of frosting on top of the second layer.
- Place your last cake round on top. Add another flat, even layer of frosting on the top layer.
- Pipe straight lines of frosting down the side of your cake in even intervals. Using a bench scraper, gently scrape the frosting around the side of your cake to create the crumb layer of frosting.
- Chill in the fridge 1-2 hours.
Extra Decoration
Prepare Bailey's Infused Ganache
- Put chocolate chips and heavy whipping cream in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave at 30 second intervals, stirring after each, until chocolate is melted.
- Stir melted chocolate chips and whipping cream until they form an even mixture.
- Add Bailey's and stir again until it forms an even mixture.
- Put a spoonful of ganache in the middle of the top layer of your cake. Using an offset spatula, spread the ganache outward from the center. Keep adding more ganache and spreading out until the ganache just starts to drip down the side of your cake.
- Put cake back in the fridge until ganache sets (around 30-45 minutes)
Prepare Bailey's Frosting Decoration
- Make a half batch of the Bailey's frosting from above (1/2 cup butter, 2 cups powdered sugar, 1/4 cup Bailey's, pinch of salt)
- Put frosting in a piping bag with a star tip (I used the Wilton 4B tip). Pip small swirls of frosting around the edge of the top layer of your cake.
- Let chill in the fridge another hour or so.
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