This is a triumph. I'm making a note here: Huge Success.

Completely from scratch, proportionate, CGI-quality, triple layer goodness. Created for you by a trusted friend in science.

Step 1: Ingredient List

Note: I designed this recipe to make a cake that will look as much as the CGI cake as possible. Oil is used in the cake instead of butter to make flatter cake layers - a lopsided Portal cake would be too sad... No pecan in mine, and I left the stems on the cherries for the picture (ala The Cake is a Lie graphics)... that's all. Hope you like it!

THE CAKE:
2 1/2 c flour
1 1/2 c cocoa powder
2t baking soda
3/4t baking powder
1t salt

3oz semisweet chocolate
1/2c hot coffee
1 c hot water
3c sugar
3 eggs
3/4c vegetable oil
1 1/2c buttermilk
1t vanilla

ITALIAN CREAM FROSTING:
14oz cream cheese, cold
14 oz butter, room temp
2t vanilla
6c powdered sugar

COCONUT FILLING:
1/3 of the prepared Italian cream
2 cups shredded coconut, sweetened

CHOCOLATE FROSTING:
2/3 of the prepared Italian cream
8oz bittersweet chocolate melted with 3T water, and then cooled a bit

COOKIE CRUMB COATING:
9oz pkg Nabisco Famous Chocolate Cookie Wafers

TOPPING:
2 tubes of white cake decorator icing
8 perfect, red cherries, stem on or off – you choose

Step 2: Instructions

THE CAKE:
Preheat oven to 300ºF. Butter and line the bottoms of three 8” cake pans with parchment. Butter and flour pans.

Add all dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl. (Whisk together gently – just as good as sifting if you ask me…)

Chop up chocolate into hot coffee/water and stir until it has melted. Beat eggs for 5 minutes, then slowly add oil, buttermilk, vanilla, and melted chocolate. Mix in sugar, then dry ingredients. Beat on medium until just combined.

Divide batter between the cake pans, sprinkle with coconut flakes (optional), and bake for about 60 minutes. (Until tester comes out dry – a knife or a toothpick or whatever…) Cool completely.

ITALIAN CREAM:
Blend cream cheese, butter, and vanilla, then add 2c of powdered sugar at a time until it’s all combined.

COCONUT FILLING:
Mix 1/3 of the Italian cream frosting with a couple cups of shredded coconut. This will be the filling for your triple layer cake.

CHOCOLATE FROSTING:
Chop up chocolate and melt in a heavy pan with 3T water. Be careful not to overheat it – overheated chocolate will separate and get all grainy. Let it cool a bit, then add it to the remaining 2/3 of the Italian cream frosting. This will frost the outside of the assembled cake.

CRUMB COATING:
To get the awesome Portal cake texture, crush up a package of chocolate wafer cookies into fine crumbs (you could do this in a food processor or just smash them with a mallet like we did…) then press the crumbs onto the frosted cake. This also gives you a chance to flatten out the frosting and give the cake a more CGI shape.

8 PERFECT DECORATIONS:
This is really easy, except for the fact that each one has to be perfect. Take a tube of white cake decorator icing and hold it over the spot where you want a perfect round of white. Just squeeze in place and let it make it’s own circle of icing. Make sure they are perfectly spaced in quadrant halfs, octants, and/or at 45º intervals because your Portal fan will notice all flaws. Put the cake in the fridge for a couple minutes so the icing can harden a little. While you’re waiting, empty an entire jar of cherries and find the 8 most perfect specimens. Dry them off gently with a paper towel. (You don’t want red cherry dye to run into your white circles…) Carefully press each cherry into the center of each white circle. Aaaand, perfect.