August 4, 2006

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Molten Chocolate Cake

UPDATE (20080413): After eating at Jean-Georges in New York, I now realize why mine never came out quite right. His are much smaller. They are like mini-cupcake-sized, as opposed to cupcake-sized. Still, his recipe is all over the internet. Use that.

UPDATE (older): I no longer think that this is a very good recipe for Molten Chocolate Cakes. These have always turned out tasty, but far from perfect. There are many better recipes that I've found, and the best are Jean-Georges Vongerichten's original ones, so search for that recipe if you want to make molten chocolate cakes.

Molten chocolate cakes are another dessert that deserves to be demystified. I'll come right out and say it: molten chocolate cakes are just undercooked cakes. The reality is a bit more complex, but your basic molten chocolate cake is just a cake that hasn't been cooked all the way through, so that the center remains "molten," a.k.a. runny.

The amazing thing is how wild people go for these things despite the fact that they can be made, from start to finish, in 20 minutes, with no skill required for any part of the dish. Serve with store-bought or pre-made ice cream, and you've got an entire awesome dessert started, finished, and served before any has finished a small glass of coffee after dinner. And there are few ingredients as well.

However, there are some variations. Some people prefer to cook their cakes more completely, but to add chocolate (for instance, a few chocolate chips) to the center of the cake batter before baking. Then they cook the cakes a bit longer, but the chocolate just melts and stays cocooned inside the cakes. There are also more and less complex recipes. This is one of the simpler ones. I've made molten chocolate cakes from about three different recipes of varying complexity, and found them all to be almost exactly the same. The only factors that really changed the cakes were the oven temperature and the length of the cooking time. I do recommend adding the chocolate chips to the center of the cakes and baking a bit longer.

I served it this time with strawberries, and made a strawberry sauce for it as well. I was riding my bike past 24th and Mission and saw a man selling strawberries for $1 per pint, so I took him up on his offer for a couple pints. That's one of the major perks of the Mission District in San Francisco.

Molten Chocolate Cake

Makes 3 small cakes. Prep time: 10 minutes. Cooking time: 12 minutes.

The ingredients:

  • 4oz bittersweet chocolate, at least 60% cocoa (1/2 cup)
  • 4 tbsp butter (1/2 stick)
  • 2 large eggs
  • 6 tbsp sugar
  • 6 tbsp flour
  • pinch of salt

The algorithm:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Melt butter and chocolate together in a double boiler.

Whisk eggs and sugar together until light and a bit fluffy. Add flour and a pinch of salt, and mix well. Add the chocolate-butter mixture and mix well. Divide batter in six ramekins, or six souffle cups, or if those aren't available, six pockets of a muffin tin (but that will make them difficult to get out one at a time). Drop a few chocolate chips into the center of each cake and press them down inside.

Put in oven and heat for about 15 minutes, until the sides are set, but the centers of the cakes are slightly runny. When done, take out and let cool for about a minute. Then, to get the cakes out, run a knife around the edge of each cake, and turn it over directly onto the serving dish. There is a decent chance that it will fall apart, so you want to get it immediately onto the serving dish.

Then serve. Tonight I served mine with a strawberry sauce and strawberries, but it's also great with vanilla ice cream, with chocolate ganache, or, my favorite, with a mint fudge sauce.

Posted by Barzelay at August 4, 2006 2:59 AM | Comments (11) | EatFoo 1.0 Posts


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As Im not a big dessert person, I don't have much experience cooking cakes and such so I was one of the people that previously assumed molten cakes were something special and complex. The short ingrediants list and short prep and cook time makes the dish quite attractive for the 3 course meals Ive been getting myself into lately. will definitely check it out

Posted by: Adam Rugg at August 4, 2006 12:01 PM


Looks yummy!

How many chocolate chips would you use per cake? And how do you make sure they stay in the center and don't just sink to the bottom? Do you rub them in flour first?

Posted by: Natasha D'Souza at August 4, 2006 6:46 PM


They stay wherever you put them because the batter is pretty thick. How many you use depends on the chocolate chip size. There isn't any standard chocolate chip size. I used Ghirardelli bittersweet chocolate chips, which are significantly larger than Toll House ones, for instance. If they're the smaller ones, I'd use maybe 6 chips. If they're the larger ones, maybe like 3.

I realized that I never bothered taking any photos of the molten innards of the cakes. Once my roommates and I dipped our spoons in, there was no pausing for photos. Oops.

Posted by: Barzelay at August 4, 2006 6:53 PM


Oh, and an idiosyncrasy: Despite my paranoia about raw chicken, I have no problem using eggs that haven't been cooked, or haven't been fully cooked in desserts like mousse and molten chocolate cake. It proves that my careful handling raw chicken is irrational, because I'm clearly not worried about the actual disease risks.

Posted by: Barzelay at August 4, 2006 6:56 PM


Idiosyncrasy is a symptom of genius. At least, that's what I tell myself.

The photos you've taken of the cake are spectacular. Did you teach yourself these camera tricks? Any particular camera you recommend? I'm in the market for a good digital camera.

Posted by: Natasha D'Souza at August 5, 2006 3:32 PM


Yeah, I guess I taught myself photography tricks. I've been doing random photography for fun since high school. The skills you need for photos like this are not that tough to learn. Half of them are taken on automatic exposure mode, with the only change of setting I make to put the camera into macro (close-up) mode. I learned mad Photoshop skills in college, and that helps a lot, too.

As for digital cameras, I think Cara might have a better perspective on this than me, but I do have some preferences. It really depends on how much you're looking to spend, what sort of photos you're looking to take (art shots and food vs. party and club shots), and how big you mind your camera being. I love the Canon Powershot series. Most of these were taken with my Powershot A75. The newer model of that would be this camera, which is pretty cheap at $224. But it isn't an especially small camera. It'll fit easily in your purse, but won't fit in your pocket. I have a second camera that is tiny, just for carrying around with me all the time, and it's 5 megapixels (my Canon is only three), but the pictures aren't that great because the lens is so small.

Posted by: Barzelay at August 5, 2006 8:25 PM


Thanks for the suggestion. I'm looking for one that'd have enough bells 'n whistles to take both party/club photos and more artistic shots. This camera does look very spiffy and ability to fit in a purse is crucial! I'm actually surprised by the price; I thought the average digital camera cost twice as much. Clearly, I need to do more research...

Posted by: Natasha D'Souza at August 6, 2006 8:55 PM


Well, that camera would be great for both types of photos. It has all the manual settings that make it great for artsy shots, but the point-and-shoot mode is great. The only reason I have a second camera is because mine is too big to fit into my pockets. If I carried a purse, I'd have no reason for another. Also, the new model to which I linked is significantly thinner than the one I have, but without shrinking the size of the lens, so that's good. Yeah, I'd probably recommend that one.

There is really no reason to spend more than $280 or so on a camera, unless you're trying to get something super small, or super high quality. But to that $224, remember to add $30 or so for a big memory card (but buy it online, not at a store--it's like 1/3 as expensive that way), $25 for a shitty tripod, and $15 for rechargeable batteries if your camera doesn't already come with them (or for a spare if it does).

Posted by: Barzelay at August 6, 2006 9:03 PM


I finally got around to making these cakes and they got an excellent reception! I added some cardamom and cinnamon to the butter while melting it and served the warm cakes with a scoop of dulce de leche ice-cream on top so that it'd start slowly melting into the cake. Yum!

There were some tricky bits I didn't anticipate. The cakes did end up getting cooked rather completely. They developed a cracked dome appearance on top and they weren't completely flat on the bottom when I popped them out of the ramekins. So I have a feeling my oven was much hotter than 425F when I put them in. How long do you preheat the oven for? Next time around, I think I'll preheat at a lower temperature and leave them in for 10 minutes instead.

I found it a little difficult to whisk in the flour with the egg and sugar mixture as it became pretty thick and hard to whisk. Also, I had to take great care and stir in the melted butter and chocolate mixture very slowly as it was piping hot and I didn't want the eggs to start cooking already.

Pouring the mix into ramekins was slightly tricky as its pretty sticky and goopy and needed to be coaxed out a little bit. Still I'll go for a sticky chocolate mess over any other kind of mess. Maybe my batter was just not right.

Next time around I'll have to be more meticulous about the placement of the chocolate chips and will literally place them individually in the center, else they'll just land every which way as I found.

In the end, it's all chocolate so it's all good.

I think my lack of grace and dexterity made this recipe a little more tricky than I expected.

Posted by: Natasha D'Souza at August 23, 2006 4:01 PM


Molten chocolate cakes simply melt in your mouth. We are just crazy about it. I have been searching for a recipe without eggs but without any luck, Do you have such a recipe.

Posted by: Sabi at May 7, 2007 6:22 AM


I no longer think that this is a very good recipe for Molten Chocolate Cakes. These have always turned out tasty, but far from perfect. There are many better recipes that I've found, and the best are Jean-Georges Vongerichten's original ones, so search for that recipe if you want to make molten chocolate cakes.

Posted by: Barzelay at May 7, 2007 5:30 PM

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