Peanut Butter Cake with Chocolate Buttercream – moist and rich peanut butter cake layers with a silky, decadent chocolate buttercream.

The Cake That Started It All
This past December marked my 10-year cake-iversary! TEN YEARS! I can hardly believe it was that long ago that I made my first cake from scratch. Time has flown by!
My first cake was for Westin’s 1st birthday. I was hoping to impress my in-laws and picked a recipe from one of their favorite food magazines, Bon Appetit. It was a peanut butter cake with chocolate frosting. It obviously spoke to me. I got all new pans, fresh ingredients and studied the recipe the best I could. Making this cake was so fun, but I enjoyed even more sharing it with our guests that sunny Saturday afternoon as we sang “Happy Birthday” to our little guy. I found so much joy in everyone’s reaction as they ate this cake I had made.

I remember being so proud of this moment. This cake creation, that is now referred to as my “poofy cake,” was the cake that started it all. And how about that homemade cake topper out of craft paper! Dying!
I eventually moved on from making my own cake toppers (thank heavens!), but making my own cakes was something that would stay with me forever!

Peanut Butter Cake
To celebrate 10 years of blissful, sometimes (ok, often times) trying, cake making, I set out to recreate Westin’s birthday cake. I couldn’t find the exact recipe I used back then, darn it. It would have been fun to compare my recipe to the original.
For my cake layers, I used my peanut butter cake recipe you’ve likely seen in my Peanut Butter and Jelly Cake and my Peanut Butter Dream Cake. There’s a full cup of peanut butter and a smidge of cinnamon to give it the most dreamy flavor.

The coloring reminds me a bit of my Classic Yellow Cake. But don’t worry, the flavors are totally different 😉

Chocolate Buttercream
For the buttercream, I replicated the Bon Appetit recipe with my go-to chocolate frosting recipe. It’s so silky and smooth, and the flavor is incredibly delicious!

TIP: Remember, when you’re making a buttercream with any kind of chocolate in it, heat the cream in the recipe and then pour it over the chips to melt. You’re basically creating a ganache that you’ll then pour into the buttercream. This ensures you don’t have any chunks of chocolate in your buttercream. (Big thanks to my friend Annie for sharing this awesome tip that I now swear by!).

This one is an easy cake recipe, so if you’re a beginner baker, add this to your list!
Enjoy!
This is a delicious peanut butter cake recipe! The cinnamon goes the extra mile to make it amazing. I highly recommend. This is a large cake (lots of cake batter), so it is tall. It almost didn’t fit in our cake holder! I added an extra dose of chocolate ganache to the buttercream to make it super chocolatey. I would totally make this cake again. Loved it!!
Thank you so much!