Great 3-Ingredient Chocolate Cake | Baking for Happiness (2024)

This delicious, easy 3-ingredient chocolate cake is tremendously moist. All you need is chocolate, eggs and butter - ready!

Chocoholics and sweets lovers, watch out! For this recipe, you really only need chocolate, eggs, and butter - and you can make a wonderfully moist cake in no time at all.

Taste and Occasion

Can chocolate, eggs, and butter make a delicious cake worthy of the name? Oh yes - as this 3-ingredient chocolate cake proves! Just the thing when you're craving cake but have hardly any baking ingredients at home. Or if, like me, you love super-juicy pastries in general… Because that's what it is, this easy 3-ingredient chocolate cake.

In the US, you call this cake "fudgy". Like brownies, the cake has a relatively moist, "crunchy" consistency. But while baking recipes with 3 ingredients in the US often look like one of them is a baking mix 😉 , this recipe won't lead you astray.

Ingredients

You need, of course: chocolate. This should already be high quality since it is the main ingredient and accordingly responsible for the taste. In addition, there are eggs, which result basically alone in the volume since it is a 3-ingredient cake without flour or similar. The last ingredient is butter, which makes the dough creamy. Unfortunately, the idea for this recipe is not really my invention 😉 . The principle of baking such a quick chocolate cake with few ingredients exists in various places. However, I have tested several alternatives for you to find out the best.

When calculated to one egg, such 3-ingredient chocolate cake recipes range from 50-70 grams of chocolate to 15-30 grams of butter. Some bake the dough generally in the oven, while others cook it more at a low temperature. Sometimes the eggs are separated, and beaten egg whites are used. Baking times also vary significantly. I think the preparation in a water bath is the best, as it prevents the cake from collapsing big. You must keep a few things in mind to ensure that chocolate, eggs, and butter don't turn into a flat result. The preparation is quite similar to that of chocolate mousse.

How to make the 3-Ingredient Chocolate Cake

Let's start with this great 3-ingredient chocolate cake: First, chop the chocolate and melt it with the butter in a hot water bath. Then transfer to a mixing bowl, set aside, and let cool slightly. Meanwhile, beat the eggs in a food processor for 5-10 minutes until very light and fluffy. Preheat the oven to 340°F/170°C. The cake will later be cooked in a water bath. To do this, cover the bottom of a small springform pan (8 in / 20 cm), which should close very well, with baking paper, and grease the edges well. Additionally, "wrap" completely all around with aluminum foil.

Add about a third of the egg mixture to the melted, lukewarm chocolate and fold in carefully but gently with a dough scraper. Maintaining the volume as much as possible in the process is important. Then fold in the remaining egg mixture in the same way. Fill a deep baking sheet, large baking dish, or roaster with hot water that should be about two-thirds as high as the springform pan. Place on an oven rack, place the cake in the springform pan in the water, and bake in the water bath for about 25 minutes.

After this, carefully remove it from the water bath and let it cool briefly. Turn out the cake, remove the baking paper and eat either lukewarm or well-chilled. It also tastes great straight from the freezer. So: enjoy!

Top Tip

As with chocolate mousse, the most crucial step is to beat the eggs until very, very foamy. And not to make this mass collapse again at the end when liquid chocolate and butter are added. Yes, some of the volume is inevitably lost in the process. But just not the whole volume 😉. The result is a quick chocolate cake with 3 ingredients that tastes tremendously delicious, moist, and sinful 🙂 !

Recipe Card

Variations

One more note about the 3 ingredient chocolate cake: You should not have false expectations. It will be a little different than "normal" chocolate cake like this classic one, the alternative sheet cake, or the one with almonds. But: I personally love it! And like to have a few pieces of the quick chocolate cake with few ingredients on hand. Nearly directly from the freezer, it tastes particularly great 🙂 . By the way, my marzipan cake, the biscuits, the banana pancakes, and the nut nougat cream come with a maximum of 3 ingredients!