It’s the boyfriend’s birthday, so I made him a happy birthday cake. He’s a classic boy with classic tastes (hence the yellow cake with chocolate frosting he asked for earlier this month). I however, have been watching a lot of The Great British Bake Off or the Great British Baking Show for people watching on netflix, so I wanted to make something especially elaborate. So I compromised and went with a classic flavor but with a bunch of layers. So chocolate chip cookie dough cake!
This is a 4 layer brown sugar cake, with two layers of cookie dough frosting, and with a layer of and frosted with whipped cream frosting.
I made two thin sheet cakes in a 9×13 pan, let it cool and coated one of them with cookie dough frosting.
Then I stacked the second layer on top of the frosting, and cut the cake in half. Then I made the whipped cream frosting, topped one of the halves with it, and placed the second half on top and coated the whole thing with frosting. And covered the imperfections with mini chocolate chips.
The cake totally tastes like chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. The brown sugar cake is delicious and light, the cookie dough tastes exactly like cookie dough and the frosting adds a creaminess and a bit of sweet.
This chocolate chip cookie dough cake recipe comes from many many places. The brown sugar cake is an amazing betty crocker recipe. The cookie dough frosting is from Sprinkle Bakes. And the frosting recipe is a classic recipe, that I sourced from here.
Put all together and you get a really really delicious chocolate chip cookie dough cake. It’s a lot of steps but if you’re busy like me, you can do the cake and cookie dough filling one night – wrap up the cake in cling wrap and refrigerate over night, then frost and serve next day.
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 cups packed light brown sugar
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup butter, softened
- 4 eggs, best at room temperature
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 3/4 cup milk
- 3/4 cups light brown sugar
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 1/4 cups flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4-1 cup heavy cream (the original recipe only calls for 1/4 cup, but to get it to a spreadable consistency, I used closer to a cup.)
- 1/2-1 cup mini chips (to taste really)
- 5 Tablespoons flour
- 1 cup milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 cup butter, room temperature
- 1 cup granulated white sugar
- Remaining bag of mini chocolate chips - I got a 12oz bag and used the whole thing between decoration and cookie dough.
Instructions
- Preheat over to 300F (yes, 300F, go low and slow for this one to prevent a dome from forming in the middle) and grease two 9x13 cake pans (or you can use two 9 inch rounds if you want a thicker cake) and either lightly flour the pans or put some parchment paper in the bottom.
- In large bowl, beat brown sugar, granulated sugar and softened butter with until light and fluffy. Don't skimp out of this step, beat for about 5 minutes with an electric or stand mixer, you really want to incorporate air to stop the cake from being really dense.
- Beat in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
- Add 2 teaspoons vanilla.
- Beat in flour mixture alternately with 3/4 cup milk on low speed until just combined.
- Pour an even amount into both pans and spread evenly.
- Bake each for about 20-25 minutes. Until the middle loses most of the shine and wetness. It's ok if it looks just slightly under done in parts.
- Allow to cool completely in pans.
- Meanwhile, while the cake is cooling, beat the brown sugar and butter together as you did for the cake, until light and fluffy.
- Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the flour and salt and mix until combined (you don't have to worry about over mixing this!)
- Add in cream a little at a time until the filling is a spreadable consistency. You may hardly have to use any, you may have to use a lot like me.
- Fold in chocolate chips.
- When cake cools, turn it out onto a cooking rack, remove parchment paper, and coat the top of one of the layers with the cookie dough filling. Use your hands if you need to.
- Top the filling with the second layer of cake.
- In a small saucepan, whisk flour into milk and heat, stirring constantly, until it thickens - really thickens to about cupcake batter consistency. Nice and thick. Be careful not to burn it. Remove from heat and let it cool to room temperature.
- You can place the saucepan over ice in the sink for about 10 minutes or so until the mixture cools if you are in a hurry. Stir in vanilla. This mixture must be completely cooled in order for the frosting to work.
- Meanwhile, beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy - you should be a pro at this by now.
- Add the completely cooled flour/milk/vanilla mixture and whip until it's like whipped cream. Scrape down the sides often to make sure it all gets incorporated (a step I didn't do enough but it's still tasty!)
- Cut your cake in half, and top one of the halves with 1/3 of the whipped cream frosting. Then place the other half on top and spread the frosting over top and along the sides.
- Sprinkle with chocolate chips and serve!