Organic Chocolate Cake with a Strawberry Acai Buttercream

I just got these fabulous cookbook, “Organic and Chic,” By: Sarah Magid. I was so excited to find this because I LOVE her philosophy being Organic and local as possible! This is completely up my ally… I must admit though, the only little thing that I was disappointed about was the food coloring she uses. It is the generic “chemical” kind. But for my recipes I want ALL of my ingredients to be as pure and chemical free as possible. Therefore, I have discovered this amazing naturally made  food coloring by “India Tree.” I paid $19 for it, but to me it’s worth it 🙂

 I made the Pink Macarons with an Organic Strawberry Acai Buttercream I had left over buttercream so I wanted to make a cake… and Since I love ANYTHING Chocolate, I made Sarah’s “Easiest Chocolate Cake…”

Ingredients

(This is the recipe cut in half for a smaller cake)

1 Cup + 2 Tablespoons Organic AP Flour

1 Cup scant Organic Cane Sugar

1/2 Cup Organic Unsweetened Cocoa Powder

1 teaspoon Baking Soda

1/4 teaspoon Sea Salt

1/2 Tablespoon ALMOND EXTRACT (This is a change I made; Original recipe called for Vanilla Extract)

1/3 Cup Organic Canola Oil

1 Teaspoon Organic White Vinegar (Apple Cider is what I used)

1 Cup Cold Water

Directions

Preheat the oven to 35o degrees F. Butter and flour a 8 or 9-inch round cake pan. In a large bowl, sift the dry ingredients together. Set aside. In a medium bowl, mix the extract, oil, vinegar, and cold water. Slowly whisk the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, 

being careful not to overmix. The mixture will be quite wet, but this is okay. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake until tester inserted in the center comes out clean, about 20-24 minutes.

Allow cake to cool then frost it with the Strawberry Acai Buttercream.