Cynthia,
A friend and I are having an argument about the differences between chocolate and red velvet cake. I said they're basically the same and taste like chocolate cake and he's saying they're not the same. Would you help us settle this argument and come bake cakes for us? We need one chocolate and one red velvet and probably a blindfold so we can taste-test fairly. Please feel free to get in contact and we can go from there. Thanks.

First, chocolate cake and red velvet differ vastly in their respective amounts of cocoa powder. The first contains more than the latter. The latter contains enough to deepen color. Pancake mix instead of flour? No. The acid component of red velvet ins proportional to the baking soda; don't tamper with it. Here is a good RV recipe:

For 1 9x2" round

Cream together 4 oz room temp butter, 10 oz sugar
Add 1 at a time, allowing each to be fully incorporated before adding the next:
2 eggs

Sift together
11 oz cake flour
1/4 oz cocoa powder
1 tsp salt

Whisk together:
8 oz. buttermilk
1 tsp. white vinegar
2 oz red food color
1 tsp. baking soda

With mixer off, add 1/3 of dry ingredients along with 1/2 of buttermilk mixture. Mix on the paddle on low speed only until no dry ingredients are visible.

Again, with mixer off, add 1/2 of remaining dry ingredients along with reaming buttermilk mixture. Mix on low speed on the paddle until no dry ingredients are visible.

Add remaining dry ingredients and mix on low speed until no dry ingredients are visible. Stop mixer, drop the bowl, and scrape all around the sides of the bowl and all around the bottom to loosen unincorporated ingredients. Mix on low speed until mixture appears homogeneous.

Line bottom of cake pan with parchment. Scrape cake mixture into cake pan. Bake at 350 degrees until finger tapped on the center top bounces, about 30-35 minutes.

Enjoy!

Red velvet cake can be chocolate or vanilla flavored and has red food coloring or sometimes beets to give it its color. There are lots of good easy chocolate cake recipes on this site. Please don't use pancake mix. It has leavening and other additives that might affect how your cake will turn out.

Here are some chocolate cake recipes:
http://www.food52.com/recipes/search?recipe_search=chocolate+cake