2024 was the year of chocolate cakes for me because I made chocolate cake for everyone’s birthday, including my own. Not on purpose. It just happened that way!

I have a small household, so there’s no need for a two layer 8″ cake — in fact, even a 6″ cake is too much for us.

That’s why I love my Cake Pan Converter Spreadsheet because I can take the best chocolate cake recipe I can find and re-calculate the measurements to my exact needs with guidelines on the baking time as well.

I’ve been particularly obsessed with these 4″ cake pans because they’re so cute and well-proportioned for my needs!

Today, I am sharing a small batch version of the Brooki Bakehouse chocolate cake.

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Mini 4″ Brooki Bakehouse Chocolate Cake Recipe

Makes two 4″ cake layers.

Ingredients

• 64.53g Canola Oil
• 60.49g Eggs (room temp)
• 60.49g Sour Cream (room temp)
• 60.49g Milk (room temp)
• 3.83g Salt
• 88.22g AP Flour
• 38.72g Dutch Cocoa
• 12.60g Potato Starch
• 2.72g Baking Soda
• 2.18g Baking Powder
• 66.75g White Sugar
• 55.00g Brown Sugar
• 72.59g Hot Coffee

Method

1. Pre-heat oven to 350°F.
2. Prepare your two 4″ round cake pans with oil and parchment paper.
3. With a whisk and a mixing bowl or stand mixer with the paddle attachment, add canola oil, eggs, sour cream, milk, and salt. Mix until smooth.
4. In another mixing bowl, combine AP flour, Dutch cocoa, potato starch, baking soda, and baking powder through a fine sieve. Add white and brown sugars to the dry ingredients and mix in until well combined.
5. If mixing by hand, switch to a silicone spatula — Mix in half of the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just combined.
6. Mix in half of the hot coffee into the batter until just combined.
7. Mix in the remaining dry ingredients until just combined.
8. Mix in the remaining hot coffee until just combined.
9. Add the 330g batter to prepared baking pans,
10. Bake for 17-20 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean with some crumbs.

Don’t have the baking pan I used? Here’s the recipe spreadsheet I created for this Chocolate Cake recipe.

How to Freeze Cake

Cake always freezes well so if you want to make this ahead of time and keep your cake moist, this is what I do:

Allow your cake to cool enough to handle but still warm.

I don’t always level my cakes at this stage if the tops didn’t dome too much. But, if I am leveling a fresh cake, I’ll use the same baking pan I baked my cake in, put something flat and smaller than my baking pan to elevate the top of the cake past the baking pan, and cleanly cut off the top layer.

Then, wrap each cake layer in plastic wrap and either freeze immediately or let it cool to room temperature, then freeze.

You want to wrap warm cake because the steam gets trapped by the plastic wrap and as you defrost your cake layers, there’s no moisture loss and your cake stays moist — at least that’s the idea lol.

Doesn’t freezing warm food grow bacteria?

I’ve heard concerns about whether taking the warm cake into a cold freezer will harbor bacteria because the general food safety rule is that you shouldn’t rapidly cool down foods.

However, cake is considered a non-potentially hazardous food meaning it doesn’t harbor and grow bacteria at room temperature like, let’s say, a casserole would.

You can keep cake out for days (weeks, even months) and while it’ll be stale and not tasty, you’re probably going to be fine. Whereas other foods become potentially hazardous after being left out at room temperature for more than 2 hours and you might have to go to the emergency room or urgent care.

It’s up to your discretion. A lot of even science-savvy bakers (you know they know) do this and I’ve had no issues myself.

But, I also don’t see anything wrong with wrapping your cakes and letting them cool to room temperature first before freezing.

Mini 4″ Brooki Bakehouse Chocolate Frosting Recipe

Ingredients

• 58g Butter (room temperature)
• 31g Powdered Sugar
• 25g Dutch Cocoa
• 62g Heavy Cream (warmed)
• 62g Dark Chocolate Bar (melted)
• 0.65g Salt

Method

1. Finely chop the dark chocolate bar and set it aside in the bowl of a stand mixer.
2. Warm the heavy whipping cream (microwave or heat in a saucepan over medium-low until just simmering).
3. Pour the warm cream over the chopped chocolate, whisk until smooth to form a ganache, and set aside.
4. In the stand mixer, add the butter and salt. Whisk on medium speed until smooth.
5. Add the sifted powdered sugar and sifted Dutch cocoa in increments, whisking until light and fluffy.
6. Pour in the chocolate ganache and mix on medium speed until light and fluffy.
7. Switch to the paddle attachment and continue mixing until the frosting is completely smooth.

I was not prepared for how amazingly delicious this frosting is! It’s fucking unreal.

While this frosting is too loose to pipe with, it’s perfect for that rustic homemade look. I added sprinkles here because I had them.

Frosting a different sized cake?

Here’s the recipe spreadsheet I created for this Chocolate Butter Frosting recipe.

Conclusion: My Brooki Bakehouse Chocolate Cake Review

The chocolate cake was very fluffy and rose a lot in the oven! The crumb was very large, so there were lots of air pockets.

Brooke called this chocolate cake as a cloud and I can confirm that it is cloud-like. The chocolate flavor is prominent and coats the mouth beautifully.

If you want something super light and pillow-y rather than dense and decadent, consider this recipe!

As to whether this is the best chocolate cake ever? I’m still on the hunt…

UPDATE: I’ve tried other chocolate cakes since and I kept coming back to this for it’s flavor. The recipe as written in the post yields a chocolate cake that is too fluffy for my liking (yes, there is such a thing for me lol). So, I have lowered the amount of leveaners in my Chocolate Cake Spreadsheet in the Recipe Library.

That being said, I’ve found my chocolate frosting.

Holy moly. So insanely rich and decadent. It tastes expensive.

She is the moment.

I will not be looking any further for any other chocolate frosting moving forward. Maybe one to pipe with if someone insists? But, I’d do everything to convince them otherwise.

WANT MORE CONVERTED RECIPES?

Check out the Recipe Library to see what other bakes you can make in over 25 baking pan sizes!