• For the Cake
• Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour three 9 inch pans. This recipe uses the Reverse Creaming Method of Mixing.
• Add dry ingredients to the bowl of your mixer and mix for one minute to blend (sugar, flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt)
• Add butter a few slices at a time and mix until it reaches a crumbly, sandy texture. Be careful not to over-mix beyond "sandy" consistency.
• In another bowl, combine sour cream, eggs, milk, and almond extract. Using a fork, mix together. This is all of your wet ingredients except for the coffee, it will be added to the batter later.
• Set a timer for 1 ½ minutes and SLOWLY add half of your egg mixture to your butter/flour mixture while mixing. Start mixer on low speed then increase to medium for the remainder of the 1 ½ minutes. Do Not Mix Above Medium Speed.
• Stop mixer, scrape the sides and bottom of bowl, and add half of the remaining egg mixture. Mix on medium speed for 20 seconds.
• Stop mixer, scrape down the sides if necessary, and add the last of the egg mixture. Mix for 20 more seconds on medium speed.
• Slowly add HOT coffee and mixing for 30 seconds to blend. Batter will be runny but that is okay!
• This recipe makes about 9 ½ cups of batter. Pour into 3 prepared 9" pans and bake at 325 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes or until the center of the cake springs back to the touch and a toothpick comes out clean.
• Cool the cake layers in the pans on a wire rack for 10 minutes before turning out.

Almond Whipped Cream Filling

• Chill the mixing bowl and beaters/ whisk attachment in the freezer for 10 minutes.
• Pour the whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla into the chilled mixing bowl, begin beating on low speed gradually increasing to medium high speed.  
• The cream begins to thicken (approx. 1 ½ minutes). We like to mix until it can hold a peak when the mixer is removed from the bowl.

Chocolate Almond Buttercream

• Add butter and mix on low to medium speed until smooth. Add almond extract and blend into the butter. Add powdered sugar, salt, and cocoa powder.
• Add most of the milk. Begin mixing at low speed so you won't have a cloud of powdered sugar in your kitchen.
• Continue to mix adding remaining milk as needed. It may take 5 to 6 minutes to reach the smoothness and consistency you like. It will take longer if using a hand mixer. As you mix the frosting will become very smooth. You can add additional milk (1 Tablespoon at a time) if the frosting is too thick or additional powdered sugar if too soft.

Assembly of Cake

• Pipe a dam of chocolate buttercream around the edge of the cake layer-- about ½ inch from the edge. I do this using a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away. (You could also do this using a ziplock bag with one corner snipped away.)
• Spread a layer of the almond whipped cream filling onto the top of the cake layer within the dam. Top with the second cake layer and repeat. Top with the third cake layer.
• Fill in any gaps between the layers with additional frosting. Frost the cake as usual. We like to do a thin (crumb coat) before chilling in the freezer for 10-15 minutes (or longer in the refrigerator) to firm things up for the final coat of frosting.
• We smoothed around the sides of the cake with a metal bench scraper and added a braided shell border around the top of the cake using large star 2M piping tip. We then pressed sliced almonds around the base of the cake. You may find this step easiest to do when the cake is chilled and frosting is firmer. Decorate however you like- enjoy the recipe!