Most recipes do not call for baking powder, but use 1 tsp baking soda and 1 tbs white vinegar added at the end. I swapped to baking powder because it is double-acting and won't expend itself during the mixing phase.
Ingredients
- 150 g (1 1/4 cup) all-purpose flour
- 100 g (1 cup) pastry flour
- 12 g (2 1/2 tsp) baking powder
- 3.5 g (1/2 tsp) salt
- 15 g (2 tbs) natural cocoa
- 30 g (2 tbs) liquid red food coloring, OR
- 25 g (2 tbs) water AND 5 g (1/2 tsp) concentrated red food coloring gel
- 5 g (1 tsp) vanilla extract
- 115 g (1/2 cup) butter
- 1 1/2 cups (340 g) sugar
- 2 eggs
- 235 g (1 cup) buttermilk
Steps
- Preheat the oven to 350 °F.
- Grease the inside of two 9-inch round cake pans. Line each with a round of parchment paper.
- Sift together the flours, baking powder, and salt.
- Mix the cocoa, vanilla extract, and food coloring to make a paste.
- Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy, about 5 minutes.
- Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until well incorporated.
- Stir in the cocoa mixture.
- Add the flour mixture in three parts alternately with the buttermilk in two parts. Incorporate well between additions but do not over-mix. Then mix until fully homogenous.
- Distribute the batter among the cake pans and level. Bake 35 to 40 minutes, until the tops spring back when gently pressed.
- Cool in the pan 10 minutes on a wire rack, then remove from the pans and finish cooling on the rack.
- Split each layer in half horizontally to yield four layers.
- Fill and frost with Cream Cheese Frosting.