Triple Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Fudge Icing

I don't use cake mixes much.  Not because I dislike them per se, it's just that I don't bake cakes that often and when I do, I usually want to make it from scratch!  This particular recipes uses a cake mix as a base, and you add a bunch of other ingredients to it, then top it with peanut butter icing.  I've made it I think 3 times over the past 5 years.  It's really very good, the chocolate cake is dense (in a nice way!), very moist, and very chocolaty because of the added chocolate chips.  I love the mini chips.  They kind of melt into the cake, adding lots of extra flavor and gooey chocolate, and stay soft.  The cake recipe is from AllRecipes, my only change is to replace half the oil with applesauce.
  

The peanut butter icing is from the Southern Plate blog, I changed it to use all butter instead of a mix of butter and shortening.  The icing is perfect for this cake!  It's thick, fudgy, sweet, and firms up rather than staying spreadable like regular frosting.  The chocolate and peanut butter flavors work fantastically together and neither overpowers the other.  This cake is a great choice for a peanut butter-chocolate lover!

Triple Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Fudge Icing
  

Chocolate Cake:

 

1 box devil's food cake mix (use the biggest you can find, mine was 16 oz)

6 oz box instant chocolate pudding mix

1/2 C water

1/2 C vegetable oil

1/2 C applesauce

1 C sour cream

4 eggs

12 oz bag mini chocolate chips
  

Preheat oven to 350 and grease a 9 by 13 baking dish.
  

Mix together everything except chocolate chips until smooth, then stir in chocolate chips.  The batter will be thick.  Spread it in the prepared baking dish and bake until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out mostly clean (the chocolate chips will prevent it from being completely clean), about 45 minutes.
  

Allow cake to cool completely before making icing.

Peanut Butter Icing:
 

1 1/2 C sugar

4 Tbsp butter

7 Tbsp milk

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 C peanut butter
  

Stir together sugar, butter, milk, and salt in a medium saucepan and cook over medium-high, stirring frequently, until it comes to a boil.  Set a timer for 2 minutes and let the mixture boil that entire time, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon.  When the time is up, remove immediately from the heat and stir in the vanilla extract and peanut butter until smooth.  Quickly spread the icing over the cooled cake, it will set up rapidly.