Another great thing about chocolate lava cakes is that you can garnish it with some delicious fruit. My favorite to add is raspberries and whip cream! I have also tried strawberries and bananas as a pair to top off these wonderful lava cakes. The great thing is, is that the garnish is completely up to you. If you are a hardcore blueberry fan, then try it with blueberries! The red fruits look really pretty on top of the chocolate. I usually try a fruit that has a color that will stand out.
Check out what our friends from the Cooking Actress have to say about this:
“We’re talking melty, warm, chocolate, gushing from the middle of a decadent chocolate cake.”
Embrace this rich, delicious, yummy chocolate lava cake that practically melts in your mouth.
Ingredients
- 10 oz. bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped (I used a mix of about 7 oz. Godiva 72%, 1 oz. Baker’s Semi-Sweet, and 2 oz. Ghirardelli 86%)
- 1/4 cup Hershey’s cocoa powder (Dutch or Natural, doesn’t matter), if very lumpy-sifted
- 10 tablespoons Land O Lakes unsalted butter + extra for greasing ramekins
- pinch of salt
- 2/3 cup egg whites (you’ll use 4-6 eggs)
- 1/4 cup Domino’s granulated sugar + extra for dusting ramekins
- Optional: 4 oz. Hershey’s bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, cut into 1/2 oz. chunks for center of each cake (you can also get creative and use something different for the molten filling–like I made one with an Andes mint in the middle)
- Garnish: Powdered sugar, berries, raspberry sauce (or, if you are me, nothing. These are too perfect on their own.)
Instructions
- Grease eight (or, in my case, 9) 6 ounce ramekins with butter, then coat with sugar.
- Have rack in center of oven, preheat to 425 degrees.
- In a pot, bring water to a simmer-then turn off heat. Place chopped chocolate in a large bowl and place over pot of simmering water-to create a double boiler. Stir chocolate, allow to melt.
- Whisk in the cocoa powder, butter (which I cut into chunks), and salt. The mixture should be smooth, with no lumps.
- In a medium bowl, whip egg whites on medium speed until foamy (which should just take a couple seconds). Mix on low speed and slowly add sugar. Once all sugar is added, increased mixing speed to medium-high and whip to medium-soft peaks.
- Fold 1/3 of egg whites into chocolate mixture. Then the next 1/3. Then the last 1/3. Be gentle-use a spatula.
- IMMEDIATELY, pour batter into a large piping bag fitted with a large round tip. (I do not know if this is necessary or not, due to the aforementioned issues when I made these, I didn’t really get to see. I’ll update you if I learn different.) Divide evenly among ramekins-filling about 1/2 of each ramekin-no more than 2/3. Use extra ramekins if necessary.
- If you want to have insurance for a molten center, to give some leeway with baking, press 1/2 oz. chocolate (or if you’re being creative whatever else you might want, like the Andes mint) into the center of the top of the cake, just below the surface.
- At this point, you may refrigerate the cakes and bake at a later time. DO NOT refrigerate before.
- Bake cakes for 8 minutes if the batter is fresh, bake for 10 if they’ve been refrigerated. You may wish to test with 1 cake first to make sure the timing is perfect. You want it to be runny in the middle, but not completely falling apart.
- Remove from oven and let sit for 3 minutes. Invert onto plate. If it is stuck and not coming out, run a thin paring knife around the edge to loosen.
- Garnish, if desired.
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Quick Tip: Serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
Thanks again to Cooking Actress for this amazing recipe.
