Homemade Snack Cakes {Red Velvet with Chocolate Buttercream}

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Melt-in-your-mouth chocolate buttercream is sandwiched between two soft chocolate cakes. Wrap these homemade snack cakes individually for a sweet, homemade, lunchroom snack for your kids!

homemade-snack-cakes-recipe

 I have always loved Little Debbie snack cakes.  When I was young, I’d use extra lunch money to buy those little pre-packaged snack cakes that were calling my name from the a la carte table in the school lunchroom.

When I taught 5th grade? Yep- you can bet what I took for a dessert in my lunch.

Then there was a short stretch when we had three little ones at home. There was really no purpose for me buying snack cakes.  If I bought them, I’d eat them, and I’d usually eat too many of them at once, so we didn’t keep them in the house.

But then… my kids got old enough so I had to pack school lunches.  Guess what little bites of sweetness re-entered my life?

homemade-snack-cakes-recipe

There’s just something about those pre-packaged cakes that are addicting.  It really doesn’t matter what kind of snack cake that it is because I love them all.

When I bit into these Chocolate Sandwich Homemade Snack Cakes here, I immediately thought about Little Debbie snack cakes.  I can’t tell you exactly which snack it reminded me of. I thought of going to the store, looking at the snack cake aisle and seeing if I could figure it out, but I thought that was a dangerous idea all-together.

Do you love soft, handheld, chocolate cakes with frosting in them middle? You’ll love these special treats.

homemade-snack-cakes-recipe

I added some Valentine’s Day sprinkles to make these festive for the upcoming holiday.  I even added a bit of red food coloring to the chocolate batter to try to get a “red velvet” look.  I used about ½ of a small bottle of food coloring and got a slight hint of red.  I could have added more, but for some reason I felt funny dumping in an entire bottle of food coloring.  Feel free to do so if you want a stronger red look.  I was happy with the slight chocolately-red color I got.

homemade-snack-cakes-recipe

You can wrap these up individually and freeze them.  Then they’ll be quick and easy to pull out for your kids’ lunches.  The problem is, they’ll be quick and easy to pull out for your afternoon snack, too.

Q: What was your favorite lunchroom snack?  I’d love to hear some fun lunchroom stories!

 

homemade-snack-cakes-recipe
homemade-snack-cakes-recipe

Homemade Snack Cakes

5 from 1 vote
Melt-in-your-mouth chocolate buttercream is sandwiched between two soft chocolate cakes.
Servings 20 servings
Prep Time 35 minutes
Cook Time 8 minutes
Total Time 43 minutes

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Ingredients
 

Instructions
 

  • Cream together the sugar, salt, butter, vanilla and egg. Sift together the flour, baking soda and cocoa. Add this to the first mixture alternately with the buttermilk. Drop the batter by teaspoonfuls (40 batter drops for 20 snack cakes) onto a greased cookie sheet and bake the cookies at 400 degrees for 7-8 minutes. Set the cakes aside to cool.
  • As soon as the cakes are cool, put the sandwiches together by spreading or piping buttercream on one cake, then placing another cake on top to make a sandwich. Shake sprinkles around the edges of the buttercream and top with powdered sugar, if desired.
  • Store in an airtight container, or wrap each cake in plastic wrap individually.

Notes

The number of servings will depend on how big you make your cakes. We usually end up with about 20 sandwiches that are about 2 inches in diameter.

Nutrition

Serving: 155g | Calories: 597kcal | Carbohydrates: 115g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 16g
Course Dessert
Cuisine American
Calories 597

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About Julie Clark

I'm Julie Clark, CEO and recipe developer of Tastes of Lizzy T. With my B.A. in Education and over 30 years of cooking and baking, I want to teach YOU the best of our family recipes.

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