Naked"ish" Chocolate Cake

3 layers of Devil's Food chocolate cake, whipped cream, sweetened condensed milk & berries. What's not to love?

Seriously, though, this cake is one of the BEST recipes I have. It's not because it's overly hard to make; it's quite simple, actually. Rather, it's one of the best chocolate cake recipes I have because it is so incredibly light, moist and fluffy and pretty much everything you'd want a chocolate cake to be.

You can't buy happiness, but you can buy the ingredients to make this cake, which pretty much equals the same thing.

It almost reminds me of the same level of moistness you'd find in a tres leches cake--the sweetened condensed milk accomplishes this by taking the spotlight to seal the deal for this dessert! The whipped cream topping also keeps this cake super light while allowing you to taste the chocolate and berries without overpowering your sweet tooth with a dense frosting.

The details:

You'll want to start by making your layers of chocolate cake and letting them cool. Two boxes of Devil's Food chocolate cake mix with make 4 layers of cake. Since you only need 3 layers for this recipe, that's an entire layer leftover to enjoy by itself, or to use to make some cake balls or a mini trifle.

Once your layers have cooled completely, take a skewer or a fork and poke lots of little holes in the tops of your layers. You'll want to be careful not to completely demolish the cake, so don't poke the holes all the way through the layers. 10-15 pokes should be plenty to allow the condensed milk to really soak in to this cake.

Place the first layer on a stand and begin spooning your sweetened condensed milk into the holes you made in the cake. Top that layer LIBERALLY with whipped cream. You really can't go wrong with a good amount of whipped cream. Repeat this process with the second and third later, too.

On your third and final layer of cake, you'll want to use an entire tub of whipped cream to make the topping tall and "showy." Finish your cake with your favorite berries, and that is it! You now have a delicious dessert that none of your guests will know took less than 10 minutes to assemble.

Variations:

The second time I made this cake, I added some chocolate chips to the cake before it went into the oven for baking. I also had two different flavors of sweetened condensed milk: my original can and one I turned into something that resembled chocolate ganache. To do this, melt a handful of chocolate chips with some sweetened condensed milk and stir until fully combined. You can add as many as you like to make it as rich as you'd like. Be sure to let the condensed milk cool back to room temperature before spooning on top of your cake.