Preheat your oven to 160C/140C fan and grease & line two 8″/20cm cake tins – leave to the side.
In a heatproof bowl, microwave the dark chocolate & butter until melted – mine takes two minutes! Pour the coffee granules into 125ml boiling water and mix – add the coffee to the chocolate/butter mix and stir well until smooth!
In a separate large bowl add the plain flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, golden caster sugar, and light brown sugar and mix well so the ingredients are all mixed with each other well!
Mix the eggs with the buttermilk – add the chocolate mix & the egg mix to the dry ingredients and stir together, try not to over mix it – it should be thick but runny when finished and no flour lumps!
Pour the mixture into the two tins and bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes (can take a little longer in some ovens) once baked leave to cool in the tin and remove afterwards, or leave for 10-15 minutes and cool on a wire rack for a softer cake.
Frosting
Beat the butter with an electric mixer for a couple of minutes to loosen it – gradually beat in the icing sugar until well combined, and add in the Baileys a spoonful at a time whilst beating.
Beat for 5 minutes until a silky lovely buttercream texture is produced. Be careful with adding all the Baileys at the same time as it might split – I used 7 tbsp.
Decoration
Get your first cake, and pipe on some buttercream using a 2d closed star piping tip and then add your second cake. Repeat the process, and decorate the top layer with some extra swirls of the buttercream.
Sprinkle on some sprinkles, and add on some Baileys truffles! Enjoy!
Notes
This recipe does contain coffee, but don’t fear, you can’t taste the coffee. I still 100% recommend including it in the recipe. You MUST also use dark chocolate in the sponge, otherwise the mixture will be too thin.
You can of course use other Irish Cream liqueurs, but I much prefer Baileys! Also, try some of the other flavoured Baileys as they all work the same!
This chocolate sponge is originally based on a recipe from BBC Good Food. The Baileys buttercream came from my Baileys Cupcakes post!
This cake will last in an airtight container for 3 days!