I realized the other day that I have never made a plain peanut butter cake. Sure I’ve made peanut butter banana cake, I’ve made peanut butter swirled chocolate cake, etc. but no plain peanut butter cake. That had to change. Since peanut butter and chocolate is one of my favorite combinations. It only seemed right to make a chocolate frosting to go with it!
The base of this fudge frosted peanut butter cake has a light peanut butter flavor, not too intense or overpowering. I was tempted to add more peanut butter (because peanut butter is good!), but I wanted to keep the texture from getting too dense. It was just the right amount of peanut butter to give it flavor while keeping the cake tender.
To top this peanut butter cake I went with an old standby. I use this same frosting for my family’s chocolate wacky cake, and it’s always been a favorite. The frosting tastes just like chocolate fudge. It’s thick, rich, and decadent. Just the right frosting for a peanut butter cake! (And just the right frosting to eat straight from the bowl. No one needs to know!)
- ⅓ C creamy peanut butter
- 1 C water
- ½ C butter
- 1 C sugar
- 1 C brown sugar
- 2 C flour
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 eggs
- ½ C milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1½ C sugar
- 3 tbsp unsweetened baking cocoa
- ⅓ C milk
- ⅓ C butter
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- Preheat oven to 375. Lightly spray a 9x13 inch baking dish with non-stick cooking spray.
- In a medium saucepan, melt together peanut butter, water, and butter over medium heat. Stir to prevent scorching. Remove from heat.
- In a large bowl, whisk together sugars, flour, salt, and baking soda. Stir in peanut butter mixture. Add eggs, milk, and vanilla extract and beat until well-combined.
- Pour batter into prepared baking dish. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Remove to a wire rack to cool.
- In a medium saucepan, stir together sugar and baking cocoa. Add in milk and butter. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Stir constantly to prevent scorching. Boil for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and add vanilla. Beat with a sturdy spoon until glossy and thickens. This will take a few minutes.
- Spread over cooled cake. Frosting hardens as it cools, so work quickly.
- Cut into pieces and serve.
The base of the cake is adapted from The Girl Who Ate Everything.
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3 Ingredient Swirled Cookie Butter Bark
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Peanut Butter Swirled S’mores Bark
Peanut Butter Honey Cereal Bars
Thank you for making this plain cake. Sometimes its all about going back to the basics!
Peanut and chocolate is the best combo ever! haha I don’t think I’ve ever made a plain peanut butter cake! That really must change… Happy Friday!
Ooh, I LOVE the combo of chocolate and peanut butter, so I know I’d love this cake. It looks fantastic!
I love the addiction of the fudge frosting, Jessica! Yum-o! Pinned 🙂
Not sure if I will have the self control to wait for Paul’s next birthday (October) to make this. 🙂 chocolate and peanut butter is his favorite combo too.
Peanut butter is good, peanut butter cake is BETTER! I may have to make the frosting just to eat with a spoon!
I don’t think I have ever had peanut butter cake but I don’t know how it could be bad. This looks fantastic! And of course with the chocolate frosting. That is a must.
Wonderful! This is my dream cake!
Now that I think about it, I’ve never actually made a plain peanut butter cake either. Thankfully, I’ve got a fantastic recipe now! 😉
I love that you used less peanut butter in this recipe. Not that I don’t love peanut butter… your cake looks like it’s hint of peanut butter flavor pairs perfectly with the frosting! Well done!
Mmmm so happy you finally (:P) made a plain peanut butter cake and topped it with this super tasty chocolatey frosting!!!
mmm, peanut butter! can’t go wrong here. 🙂
fudge frosting?! Sign me up please!
Oh my goodness, this looks delicious! The Fudge Frosting sounds amazing!
This looks amazing- that frosting sounds heavenly! 🙂
You had me at fudge frosting! I love this cake.
Peanut butter and fudge… I call that pretty perfect. 🙂
I adore peanut butter cake and that frosting looks sooooo guuuud. Fudge and PB? This combo speaks to my soul!
This is a gorgeous yet unique flavored cake. I love this twist!
Now this is a cake that would be dangerous for me to have around! I have a feeling I could eat row after row of this!
I could eat this whole pan!! The frosting itself looks like its worth the calories!! 🙂
I will never get tired of this classic combination. I want this cake all day long!
This frosting looks so fudgy. Must try!
Love this cake! Chocolate and peanut butter are so so good! I’ve never made a plain peanut butter cake before too and will definitely have to give this a try when I do 🙂
mmmm, I have never made a plain peanut butter cake either! Definitely need to try this – it looks sooo good. Chocolate PB is my husband and my favorite combo!
it looks yummy!
i need to try this!!! can anyone help with UK conversions please? (and is C sugar-confectioners or castor?) Many thanks x
C stands for cup. So it’s just plain white sugar. Allrecipes seems to have good charts for conversions: http://allrecipes.co.uk/how-to/44/cooking-conversions.aspx Hope this helps!
I was making the frosting for this cake, and it looked fine until I added in the vanilla. When I added the vanilla, and stirred it in, the frosting immediately turned into a powder (looked like I had a saucepan of cocoa powder). The frosting only sat long enough for me to measure out the vanilla. Does anyone have any idea as to what I may have done wrong? Thanks.
I am not entirely certain what could have caused this. The only thing I can think of is that the cocoa powder wasn’t completely stirred in so a pocket of it was uncovered when you stirred in the vanilla. . . I will have to look into this. I’m sorry it didn’t work for you!
This. Cake. Is. AWESOME! EASILY one of the top 3 best cakes I’ve ever had. And the frosting is absolutely indulgent! But I didn’t care for this frosting on this cake. The chocolate fudge overpowered the peanut butter flavor. Next time I’ll try the cake with a regular chocolate buttercream. And I’m going to try the fudge frosting on a regular yellow/butter cake. But both of these recipes will remain in my arsenal forever! Thank you for sharing! 🙂