If you want something to impress the chocolate lover of the household, then you’d better try your hand at this Giant Lava Molten Chocolate Cake Recipe! And if you really want to put on a show, don’t forget the sparklers! 😉
Seven years ago, my sister-in-law, Christina (-C) introduced me to the dessert I have to have every year for my birthday: a large bundt cake soaked with fudge, then topped with ice cream, caramel sauce, and chocolate shell. If you’re lucky, -C might even set off a smoke alarm by putting sparklers on top.
After moving away from basically everyone, I had to recreate this cake on my own. 
After much searching and baking, I found my favorite recipes for chocolate cake , caramel sauce, fudge sauce, and even chocolate shell. And voila! It’s so rich, but insanely delicious at the same time. So I have one of two options: (1) surround myself with all of my friends to help devour it, or (2) eat myself sick. Sometimes I just go ahead and do both. Worth it.
-C LOVES to put sparklers on this cake for the “candles”. I’m not saying it’s smart, but it is fun. Haven’t started a fire yet…..
Giant Molten Chocolate Cake
Ingredients
Cake:
- 2 cups sugar
- 1 and 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
- 2/3 cup dutch process cocoa powder plus more for dusting
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1 cup hot water
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Fudge Sauce:
- 1 cup white sugar
- 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 3/4 cup evaporated milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 tablespoons butter
Chocolate Shell:
- 4 ounces chocolate
- 3 tablespoons coconut oil or butter
Caramel Sauce:
- 1 cup sugar
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1 tablespoon light corn syrup
- 3/4 cup heavy cream at room temperature
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Other:
- 1 1.5 quart container of your favorite vanilla ice cream
Instructions
Cake:
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Preheat oven to 350. Butter a bundt pan and dust the inside with cocoa powder. Set aside.
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Sift together sugar, flour, cocoa powder, salt, baking powder and baking soda in a bowl. Set aside.
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In a mixer on low add the milk, water, vegetable oil, eggs and vanilla one at a time. Mix until everything is incorporated. Then, with the mixer still on low-speed, slowly add in the dry ingredients. Once all of the flour mixture is added, mix the batter for a full four minutes on medium speed.
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Pour the batter into the bundt pan and bake for 45 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Allow to cool to room temperature on a wire rack.
Fudge Sauce:
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In a medium saucepan, combine sugar, cocoa, salt and cinnamon. Stir to mix and to eliminate lumps.
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Pour in evaporated milk and bring to a boil over medium-high heat; boil for 2 minutes, remove from heat and stir in vanilla and butter.
Chocolate Shell:
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Place chocolate in a microwaveable bowl and microwave for one minute. Add butter and microwave another minute. Stir and continue to microwave in 20 second intervals, stirring between until smooth.
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If it gets very hot, let sit on the counter for 3-5 minutes to cool slightly. Once it’s liquid but not hot, drizzle over ice cream.
Caramel Sauce:
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Put the sugar, water and corn syrup into a medium saucepan. Cook over medium high heat, swirling the pan, but not stirring until the caramel turns an amber color. (If you get sugar crystals on the edge of your pan, use a pastry brush with water and wipe it off.)
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Lower the heat and carefully add cream and butter…standing away from pan to avoid splattering. When bubbling calms, stir sauce till smooth. Add vanilla. Pour into heatproof jar. Cool to warm or room temperature before serving.
Assembly:
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Turn cake onto serving platter. With a fork, gently poke holes through the cake
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Generously slather hot fudge sauce on cake in a few additions, giving some of the sauce time to soak in.
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Scoop ice cream into the hole in the center of the cake.
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Top ice cream with chocolate shell.
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Top off cake and ice cream with caramel sauce.
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Serve hot!
Recipe Notes
Dress it Up (Gourmet Style):
1. Add the following (one or all) as additional toppings: strawberry jam, shredded coconut, and your favorite chopped nuts. -C
Dress it Down (Quick n' Easy):
1. Use a boxed cake mix and pre-made caramel sauce, fudge sauce (heated), and chocolate shell for a much quicker version.
2. To simplify further, eliminate caramel sauce or chocolate shell. -C
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This looks amazing! Good job on getting the blog started:) I can’t wait to see what you post and start trying things out!
Thanks – we’ll have to get together and do some baking soon!
how big is this cake?
Sorry for the late response! It is the size of a normal bundt cake – probably 12-16 slices depending how big you like your pieces! 😉
is it molten inside? or is it just baked all the way through?
It is baked all the way through – just has the feel of molten because of the hot fudge and caramel that seep into it when you pour them over.
This was delicious! I cannot believe how easy this was to make! It was rich and chocolatey! I used dark chocolate and it was great. Thank you!
Yesss! So glad that you liked it. I’m in love with this cake and it’s a definite show stopper at all of our get-togethers. Kind of looks like WW III when we’re done though 😉
I’ve a few questions.
1. if I make this cake a day in advance it’ll still stay fresh?
2. If I don’t have a bundt pan, can I make it an 8 or 9 inch pan? I even have a dome shaped pan just for molten lavas. Would that work?
3. Can the batter be made a day ahead and baked the next day?
Planning to make it today, would appreciate your reply,
How do you dull the cinnamon taste from the fudge sauce? It’s quiet prominent
Hi Yumna! You can just leave it out or use much less. For us, it’s a flavor enhancer that we like in this case, but you don’t have to use it. Totally optional.
Sorry just saw this message. How did it go for you?
I’ll answer the questions as well: 1) Cake in advance is usually fine if you put it in the fridge, or at least cover it so it won’t dry out or go stale quickly. This does depend on where you live. I’m in a drier climate, so different problems than if you are high humidity.
2. I’m sure you can make it in one of those pans – but the cook time will be drastically different (much less time) so I’d look at other recipes to compare times, and just check closely and do your toothpick test. Just to clarify, This does not actually have a molten lava center, but just imitates the trademark Chili’s molten lava cake with its setup, hence the name.
3. With this cake batter, I wouldn’t make it ahead. The buttermilk, baking soda, and hot water are all very reactionary and keep the crumb light and fluffy and also the amount of time that you mix puts additional air into the batter, so if you make it in advance and cook later, I would imagine that it will turn out much more dense.
Still interested to know how it went for you. Let us know 😉
I made it for my friends party. And it was super hit. Thank you so much. But now I’ve a cup of buttermilk and was just wondering if I can make it and freeze the batter.
You know, I’ve never actually frozen cake batter of any type. But I found this great article that says you should probably be able to since this cake doesn’t have egg whites as leavening. https://www.craftsy.com/blog/2015/09/freezing-dough-batters/
Can this batter be frozen?