Checkerboard Cake

This week, in celebration of a friend's bday, I tried my hand at the checkerboard cake. I found this treasure of a cake pan set at a yard sale a few weeks back and have been eager to try it ever since. The front of the box has this adorable 1980s home scene of a blonde housewife handing a piece of cake to her very excited, backward-hat-wearing son. Totally inspirational for baking.

The cake turned out SO well and I had enough batter left over to make cupcakes for Amanda & Dave's visit this Friday. As per Amanda's request, I'm posting the frosting recipe here. It was, perhaps, better than the cake!! The recipe supposedly makes enough frosting for a 3-layer cake, but that's really only true if you prefer cake to frosting. If you prefer frosting to cake, I'd recommend doing 1+1/3 recipe (all ingredients are measured in multiples of 3, so this is simple.) 1 recipe makes enough frosting for ~12 cupcakes.

Chocolate Butter Icing (adapted from "Bake King" Checkerboard Cake Set)
Melt 3 oz baking chocolate.
Sift 3c confectioners' sugar.
Heat 6T milk to boiling (~1:45 in microwave), pour immediately into confectioner's sugar, and beat until smooth.
Add melted chocolate and cool to lukewarm.
Add 6T softened butter and beat until creamy.
Beat in a dash of salt and 1t vanilla.
Eat a spoonful
then, spread immediately.