Fudge Icing

I am sure every southern lady has a version of this recipe in their stash somewhere. My mother and mother-in-law both made this and both were amazing.

It is not for the faint of heart.

Here is my version of this fudgy goodness.

Fudge Icing

2 cups sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 squares of unsweetened chocolate*

*If you haven't bought unsweetened chocolate lately, it is packaged differently. A square is considered 1 ounce. Read the label carefully to make sure you know what now constitutes a square on many old recipes. They lowered the amount that they put in a box also. There are only 4 ounces in a box now...so that means for 2 squares or 2 ounces you will use half of the box.

Tricky way to charge you the same and give you less....just like those 4 lb bags of sugar now.

Bring these items to a boil, and then boil 1 minutes, stirring constantly.

It never ceases to amaze me that about the time the chocolate squares are melted is when it begins to boil.

Add 1 stick of butter and stir until melted.

Add 1 teaspoon vanilla.

Now, this is where the fun begins.

It takes practice to time the cooling and thickening of the frosting with the cake layers.

Also using a metal frosting spatula or butter knife is a must when icing with this frosting.

Now, to the cake...

I use Duncan Hines chocolate cake mix that you add butter to. There really is no other brand and definitely the one with butter.

Trust me...I have nothing against Betty Crocker or Pillsbury, but for this frosting...you will be very sorry if you don't use the Duncan Hines add butter cake mix.

They just go together like peanut butter and jelly.

The cake mix has also been the victim of package downsizing too. In order to really get a good cake like a 7 layer one, you gotta bite the bullet and do two mixes.

You can use the extra batter for some cupcakes.

I use the old metal WEAREVER pans. They make a great cake.

I use a soup ladle to spoon out the same amount of batter in each pan and make them really thin.

If you go with the 7 layers, you will need to do two batches of frosting as well. Cook them separately as the whole process with cooling works out well.

I have to tell you the first few times I made this frosting I got in a hurry and try to frost too soon and it would run and I would get so frustrated. 

You just have to keep stirring it and it will eventually thicken enough to frost but then you have to beat the clock so that it doesn't harden.

It really isn't hard, just takes a little time to perfect.

Trust me it is good even when it doesn't look perfect. 

A helpful hint is to put pieces of wax paper under the edges of the bottom layer, so that after icing it you can pull them out and have no mess.