What is one of the best parts of summer? Fully stocked fresh fruits at the grocery store. This Strawberry Chocolate Chip Cake is the perfect summer dessert for any occasion... or no occasion. Fresh strawberries, light and fluffy cake and melted chocolate chips topped with a dusting of powdered sugar. Paired with vanilla bean ice cream after it's been pulled fresh from the oven and you have hit the jackpot. It's so colorful and you'll find that you probably have most of the ingredients already on hand, which makes it even harder to resist not making.
- 1 and 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
- 3 tablespoons Greek yogurt
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1/3 cup chocolate chips + more to sprinkle on top after baking
- 1 pound strawberries, halved
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Line the bottom of a 9x3-inch springform pan with parchment paper. Grease the sides of the pan with butter or cooking spray.
- Sift flour, baking powder and salt together into a medium bowl.
- In a separate large bowl, combine butter, Greek yogurt and sugar using electric mixer, beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy - no more than 2 minutes.
- Reduce speed to medium, mix in egg and beat until light and fluffy. Then mix in milk and vanilla.
- Keeping the mixer speed low, gradually mix in the flour mixture, just until combined.
- Fold chocolate chips into the batter. Transfer batter to the springform pan and arrange strawberries on top of the cake. Arrange chocolate chips in spaces between strawberries.
- Bake cake for 1 hour until the top is golden brown and the tester comes out clean. In the last 5-10 minutes of baking, sprinkle more chocolate chips on top, pressing them lightly into the top of the cake. Bake for another 5-10 minutes, to allow chocolate to melt.
- When the cake is done baking, let it cool while still in the baking pan, on a wire rack. After cake has cooled for about 40 minutes, it should be ready to be released from the springform pan. If the cake is cool enough, you can slide your hand under, between the parchment paper and the bottom portion of the springform pan and move the cake with the parchment paper attached, onto a cake plate easily.
Since the strawberries make the cake very moist, it's best kept cold in the fridge. When you're ready to serve or eat it, just pull it out, microwave and it's ready to go! I used semi-sweet chocolate chips in this cake, thinking that the cake would already be naturally sweet from the strawberries and batter but I will definitely use milk chocolate chips next time. The semi-sweet chips are sweet and tasted fine in the cake, but had a slight bitter taste that comes from using semi-sweet vs. milk chocolate. I love strawberries so I'm thinking it also wouldn't hurt to add a layer of strawberries in the middle of the cake before topping the it off with a surface layer.