My family has used this recipe for a very long time. With her eyes closed, my great-grandma could make this. She baked this cake for my father every year because he was born on her birthday. even had it transported to him while he was a soldier stationed there in Korea.
| Prep Time: | 30 mins |
| Cook Time: | 50 mins |
| Additional Time: | 1 hr |
| Total Time: | 2 hrs 20 mins |
| Servings: | 10 |
| Yield: | 1 3-layer cake |
Ingredients
- 1 (4 ounce) package sweet baking chocolate (such as Baker’s German’s Sweet Chocolate®) – broken into pieces
- ½ cup boiling water
- 1 cup margarine, softened
- 2 cups white sugar
- 4 eggs, separated
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 ½ cups sifted all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1 cup evaporated milk
- 1 cup white sugar
- 3 egg yolks
- ¼ cup margarine
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 ⅓ cups sweetened flake coconut
- 1 cup chopped pecans
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour 3 8-inch cake pans and line bottoms with parchment paper.
- Place the chunks of chocolate into the boiling water and stir until the chocolate has melted; set aside to cool. In a large bowl, beat 1 cup of softened margarine with 2 cups of sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Stir in 4 egg yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and the chocolate-water mixture until thoroughly blended.
- Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt into a bowl. Beat the flour mixture into the liquid ingredients, alternating with buttermilk, in 3 or 4 additions. Beat until batter is smooth, about 1 minute.
- In a metal or glass bowl, beat the reserved egg whites until they hold stiff peaks when the beaters are lifted straight up. Gently fold the beaten egg whites into the batter, keeping as much volume as possible. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pans.
- Bake in the preheated oven until the cakes have browned lightly and a toothpick inserted into the center of a cake comes out clean, 35 to 40 minutes. Allow the cakes to cool in pans before removing.
- To make frosting, pour the evaporated milk into a large saucepan, and mix in 1 cup of sugar, 3 egg yolks, 1/4 cup of margarine, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium, and cook until thickened, stirring constantly, about 12 minutes. Remove from heat, and mix in the coconut and pecans, beating the frosting until cooled and spreadable. Frost and fill the cake with the coconut frosting.
- Instead of three round layers, you can make two 9-inch square cakes and bake them for 40 to 45 minutes.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 809 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 102 g |
| Cholesterol | 144 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 4 g |
| Protein | 12 g |
| Saturated Fat | 11 g |
| Sodium | 617 mg |
| Sugars | 74 g |
| Fat | 42 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Excellent, made this for my hubby’s birthday. As others suggested- double frosting. I would also simmer the frosting for less time. Mine was a bit thick and not very spreadable, but so delicious!
Best ever, love it ❤️
This was hard to make! Haven’t tasted it yet. I doubled the frosting and barely had enough. This was my first attempt ! I only make biscuits lol it’s very good! As another review noted, the chocolate was melted with water. It would be better done with butter. But great recipe even if it was difficult for a beginner.
I have been making this recipe for 30 plus years. Looked all over Allrecipes at different variations and found lots of “German” chocolate cakes that quite frankly should just be called a Chocolate cakes. So I decided to go back to the original recipe. Glad I did! The last time i had made this was in 2019 at my Mom’s request for her 89th birthday. It has been a while and I was at her house with her baking pans and she greased and floured them. So please take note, it is somewhat of a fragile layer so Grease, flour and parchment and spray parchment and cocoa the top. That time it came out in so many pieces we had to glue it back together with the amazing frosting laughing all the time, no one suspected it was so broken. So lesson learned last night i made it again and OMG no wonder it has stayed in my mind as one of my most favorite. No corners cut it is absolutely moist, light, and delicious. Worh the effort
The only change made was I doubled the icing!! This is a BIG family favorite!!!
So moist and so fluffy. I followed the recipe exactly as written and it was perfect. Only addition was the fudge frosting. Trust me, the work is worth it.
Second year making this cake. Had heavy cream instead of evaporated milk, also used the buttermilk powder to make a cup of buttermilk. Might in the future try chocolate buttercream on the sides, but it’s perfect like this!
Taste is delicious but I didn’t have enough icing. I had to make another recipe to even cover the top layer.
Easy to make and delicious
I made this for my son’s birthday. And The cake is absolutely yummy!! It crumbles easy but I am not a baker and I could have over mixed or something. But it was very moist and not too sweet!! The frosting was barely enough to cover the three layers but that was ok by me for it was just enough sweetness. If I make again I Will double the frosting for to be sure each layer was fully covered and more for sides. But definitely making it again!
This was a great cake to make from scratch. I also think more chocolate would be good but I added pieces of moist chocolate brownie to add chocolate. The icing is to die for. But a tip for some maybe is “cook the icing for the exact time in medium after bringing it to a boil. I freeze my cakes in order to ice them as it helps to keep them firm while decorating. With a warm icing it cools it quickly so it doesn’t slide off. I noticed in some pictures this happened. I put the icing into a cool bowl; beat it with electric beater and then onto cake. Worked beautifully. I made a 9x11x2 cake (x2) plus doubled icing and still didn’t have enough for the sides. I used chocolate ganache for layers. I’d triple the icing to ensure the cake is covered. Regardless this is a great recipe and I’ll use it again (making my own adjustments to make it mine … ).
Made this cake for my BFs birthday and it was hands down THE best cake I’ve ever had. Ran out of frosting and had to use a can of chocolate for the sides, so be prepared.
I used a 13x9x3 pan since my layer pans were not deep enough. It cooked in about 40 minutes. We’ll see how it tastes tonight!
I’m sorry that I have to give this recipe only one star, and that’s strictly for the sake of the icing. The cake itself does not have enough chocolate flavor, and it was way too crumbly. It began to crumble apart as it came out of the pans even though I sprayed, floured, and used parchment. Additionally, it simply did not have enough structure to stand up to the weight of the icing. I think that is from whipping the egg whites separately and folding them in at the end. That technique is generally used for tube pan, or Bundt pan cakes that only require a light glaze. So sorry.
Loved it
Delicious & a show-stopper! Instructions easy to follow. I’ve made this about 6 times & always comes out great!
This turned out great! The only thing I had to comment about was that there was not enough icing, so I had to make more. But other than that the recipe was fantastic!
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Amazing! Thank you so much for sharing your wonderful family recipe ??
Very yummy! I didn’t have sweet chocolate or buttermilk, so I used bittersweeet and did the milk + 1 tbsp. vinegar trick, and it worked fine. The frosting was insufficient, so I had to make extra.
Excellent recipe and highly recommend for the German Chocolate Cake enthusiast.