Molten Chocolate Lava Cake

Servings : 6 lava cakes

The molten chocolate lava cake is truly one of the most delicious and most romantic desserts. Is there anything more luscious than a moist warm chocolatey cake with a deliciously rich chocolate filling that spills out as you dip your spoon in? If you’ve never tasted this divine dish, then you are missing out!!

I love to serve this with vanilla or coffee ice-cream, the warm chocolate goes soo beautifully with the cool soothing flavour of ice-cream. It also goes well with softly whipped cream and fruits.

Ingredients

  • 1/4 cup sugar (50gm)
  • 1/2 cup butter, at room temperature (113gm)
  • 2 large whole eggs
  • 2 egg yolks
  • 2 tbsp. plain/all purpose flour
  • 2 tbsp. icing sugar, sifted (30gm)
  • pinch of salt
  • 2 tbsp. half n half cream or whole milk, at room temperature
  • 1 tsp. vanilla
  • 6 oz. semi-sweet chocolate, chopped (180gm)

Instructions

This makes 6 lava cakes. First, butter 6 ramekins very well to make sure the cakes don’t stick in them during baking, then dust them with a bit of flour or sugar. (I used 4 oz. ramekins, each is about half a cup in size. You can use a muffin pan if you do not have ramekins, just don’t use any liners and make sure you butter the pan very well)

Chop the chocolate, put it in a heatproof bowl along with the butter, icing sugar and milk. Place over a double boiler and melt whilst stirring every now and then until you have a smooth mixture. You can even melt this in the microwave. Set aside and let this mixture cool.

Put the eggs and egg yolks in another bowl, add the sugar, salt and vanilla and beat using a beater or whisk until the eggs turn light and lemony in color and ribbons form when you lift the beaters out of the mixture. Now gently add the melted chocolate mixture a little at a time, and using a whisk, briskly whisk together to combine. Keep adding the chocolate mixture until all is mixed into the egg mixture.

Sift the flour over your batter and gently whisk it in until the mixture is well-combined. Very little flour is added in this recipe because the main purpose of the flour here is to help hold everything together, the dessert is mainly a rich chocolaty one.

Now divide this batter amongst the prepared ramekins. Place them on a tray, cover with cling film and refrigerate for at least an hour, although you can refrigerate for up to 24 hours before baking.

If the batter is refrigerated for longer than 6 hours, it would be best to keep the ramekins out for about an hour before popping them into the preheated oven so they lose some of the chill before baking. They also will need a few minutes longer to bake. 🙂

When ready to bake, preheat the oven at 200 C and then place the ramekins on a tray and pop them into the center rack of your oven. The baking time ranges from around 10-15 minutes depending on different ovens and different tastes. What I did when I first made these is, I baked just one cake first and checked how it turned out. I have a fan-assisted oven and was satisfied with the results at exactly 12 minutes. You can try first with just one and see how it turns out, if you want it a bit more solid, bake the next batch for 1-2 minutes extra, if you want the center softer, bake for less time. Since these gorgeous cakes don’t take long to cook, it shouldn’t be hard finding the perfect baking time to suit your taste. You can’t go wrong, coz if baked less it still will taste fantastic and gooey and if baked too long, you still end up with a yummy moist chocolate cake. :))

Once you get them out of the oven, place the ramekins on a wire rack to cool slightly, about 2-3mins. Then run a knife around each cake to make sure it isn’t stuck and carefully turn each one over on a plate. Dust with icing sugar. Serve with a scoop of ice-cream and enjoy the most decadent and ultra-delicious dessert ever!

Enjoy!

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