The Best Chocolate Cake for Grandpa's 90th

My most wonderful Grandpa turned 90 in March. If you are fortunate enough to have met him you will know just how special my Grandpa is. Despite nearing a century on this earth, he remains as sharp as ever, feeding his mind with endless puzzle books and episodes of Pointless. He never fails to make me laugh and keep my feet plantedfirmly on the ground. There's nothing like the perspective of a grandparent to shift your focus and make you realise just how good you've got it, especially from one who has endured many battles of his own. I was so glad we got to celebrate his birthday just before lockdown, and I had the privilege of making his cake! He had to have the very best, so I combined a couple of my favourite recipes and came up with the best chocolate cake for the best Grandpa.

Since I live in south Wales and Grandpa is in Glasgow, a fair amount of planning went into this cake to make sure it was fresh, delicious and still in one piece on the big day. I decided to bake the sponges a few days before traveling, freeze them and on the morning of our journey, I packed them securely into boxes with ice packs. When we arrived in Scotland the cakes had defrosted but were still cold, so I popped them in the fridge and, the next day, I assembled, iced and decorated it ready for the party 🥳

This cake is so delicious and I can't take much of the credit – Smitten Kitchen (one of my favourite food bloggers) shares her 'I want chocolate cake' cake here, which I simply quadrupled for this four-layered, 8-inch cake (with some to spare for a cake for me to snack on). The buttermilk and dark muscovado sugar are what make this cake SO yum – you'll never use another recipe again.

For the crumb coat, filling and neat coat I used the ultimate chocolate buttercream recipe from Love is in my Tummy, again multiplying the quantities by four (it's better to make too much). This buttercream is a total dupe of the infamous Magnolia Bakery's chocolate buttercream – so light, chocolatey, buttery and downright delicious, not to mention an absolute dream to work with. My drips were made with a simple cream and chocolate ganache and I finished it off with a touch of buttercream piping and loads of edible glitter and gold dust. I cannot live without my turntable, palette knife and side scraper and wouldn't dream of decorating a cake like this without those three tools, so if you're thinking having a go (and you totally should) get yourself some off Amazon (they're dead cheap) and see how you get on!

Safe to say we ate the lot and Grandpa had an epic 90th birthday. Since lockdown I have been phoning him a lot more, but I can't wait to be able to see him in person again, hopefully very soon.