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I made it & i now understand the logic behind i. Sure, you don't want to lace a cake with bottles of e numbers but.......food colour is natural now and this technique ( food colour + reaction of acid on cocoa) gives a cake that looks like choc but isnt strongly choc flavoured. I sandwiched the layers with a frosting that had thickened (cooked) cornflour in it (on line with one of the red velvet recipes). I coated the outside with cream cheese white choc frosting....no icing sugar..... so the cake wasn't too sweet. It looked spectacular with 6 layers ( the baking soda/buttermilk gives a strong texture) and it wasnt sickly sweet.....RESULT