since i had some leftover buttermilk from the donut muffins i made earlier in the week i was trying find recipes that i could use with it. short of making biscuits, fried chicken, and scones, the only other recipes i could find were various forms of chocolate cake or red velvet cake. i opted for a chocolate cake! (originally i was planning on sending the cake off to work with my husband but was very critical of the way it looked- and since marshmallows can create such a gooey mess, i decided against it! and especially after my husband told me it tasted better than it looked! thanks honey!)

i got the Paula Deen recipe from Food Network. it was yummy, but boy was it sweet!!! i’ve only been able to take a few bites here and there…and unfortunately since i didn’t send it off to work with my hubby, we still have pretty much the entire cake left!

Mississippi Mud Cake:

• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 cups flour
• 1 stick butter (softened)
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup cocoa
• 1/4 cup water
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 package mini marshmallows

for the icing:

• 1 stick butter (softened)
• 3 tbsp cocoa
• 6 tbsp milk
• 1 cup walnuts (or pecans)
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 box confectioners sugar

• preheat oven to 350 degrees. grease a 13×9in pan
• combine all ingredients except for marshmallows and beat with handmixer
• bake for approximately 25 minutes (test with a toothpick until it comes out clean)
• once the cake has finished, sprinkle mini marshmallows (i ended up putting the cake back into the oven with the marshmallows when the oven turned off but was still hot so that the marshmallows would melt a bit)
• to make the frosting, melt the butter and mix the remaining ingredients together (i used a hand mixer again). the original recipe said to boil the butter and ingredients but i opted not to do it that way-the melted butter alone was enough to mix the sugar together. (you also might need to add more than the box of confectioners sugar otherwise it might be a bit runnier than you’d like!)