Chocolate Cream Cheese Cake

1. Grease and flour three 8×1 1/2 or 9×11/2 inch cake pans; set aside. In a
large mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set
aside.

2. In a mixing bowl beat together cream cheese, butter or margarine, and
vanilla with an electric mixer on medium speed till fluft~~ Add melted
chocolate; beat till well blended.

3. Alternately beat in the 8 cups powdered sugar and the 1/2 cup milk.
Transfer 3 1/2 cups of the mixture to another large mixing bowl to use for
part of the cake batter and set aside.

4. You should have about 2 cups of the mixture remaining, which will be
used for the frosting. To this mixture, beat in enough of the additional 1
to 2 cups of sifted powdered sugar to make it a spreading consistency ~
Cover frosting and refrigerate till needed.

Add eggs to the 3 1/2 cups cream cheese rnixture; beat 1 minute at mediurn
speed. Add flour mixture and the 1 cup milk alternately to the egg mtxture,
beating at low speed after each addition just till com- bined. Pour batter
into prepared pans. (‘f you don’t have three cake pans of the same size,
chill a portion of the cake batter for up to 1 hour before baking.) Bake in
a 3500 oven for 25 to 30 minutes for 8-inch pans and 22 to 25 mmutes for
9-inch pans or till a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean.
Cool in pans for 10 minutes. Remove; cool on wire racks. Remove frosting
from refrig- erator about 30 minutes before frost- ing the cake. Place one
cake layer on serving plate; spread with half of the raspberry preserves.
Top with second layer; spread with remaining jam. Top with third cake
layer. Spread top and sides with frosting. Cut in wedges to serve. Gamish
each serv- ing with a white Chocolate Star and fresh raspberries, if
desired. Makes 16 servings.