Tessa’s Recipe Rundown
Taste: Tons of rich chocolate, with a surprise of tangy cheesecake goodness!
Texture: Moist, light, and fluffy, with a luscious cheesecake filling and wonderfully fudgy chocolate glaze.
Ease: Simple and fun to make!
Pros: Deliciously decadent twist on a classic cake.
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Cheesecake Filled Chocolate Bundt Cake is pure decadence in cake form.
The only thing that could possibly improve a rich, moist, ultra-chocolaty bundt cake? A secret cheesecake filling.
Finished with the fudgiest chocolate glaze you’ve ever tried, this showstopping bundt cake is as gorgeous as it is indulgent.
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Holly on Instagram made this recipe and says, “The deep chocolate flavor pairs perfectly with the tangy cream cheese.” Check out her gorgeous photo:
This Cheesecake-Filled Chocolate Bundt Cake is what dessert dreams are made of. I hope you love it as much as I do!
Sprinkle of Science
How to Make Cheesecake-Filled Chocolate Bundt Cake
How to Make MOIST Cake
- Measure your flour correctly. Accidentally adding too much flour will yield a dense, dry, or crumbly cake. Use the spoon and level method to measure your dry ingredients.
- Brown sugar. Brown sugar adds more moisture than granulated sugar. Whatever you do, do not reduce the amount of sugar in this recipe – learn why here.
- Eggs. This cake contains 5 eggs for richness, fudginess, moisture, and structure. I do not recommend using egg substitutes. Use room-temperature eggs to ensure they blend smoothly into the batter, and use large eggs, about 56 grams in shell. Smaller or larger eggs will yield a different result.
- Sour cream. This helps make the cake more tender and fudgy and activates the baking soda. Be sure to use full-fat sour cream at room temperature. Full-fat plain yogurt will work as a substitute.
- The cocoa powder. More on this just below.
The Cocoa Powder
I recommend using Dutch processed cocoa powder, for an intense but smooth chocolate flavor. I particularly love Guittard or Penzey’s Dutch cocoa powder products.
Dutch-process cocoa powder also typically has a higher fat content compared to grocery store natural cocoa powder products. The latter is often chalky and zaps moisture in your cakes. Learn more about Natural vs. Dutched cocoa powders here.
If you must, you can use natural cocoa powder with as a 1:1 substitute. Note that the color, texture, and chocolate flavor will change.
The Chocolate
This cake batter contains bittersweet baking chocolate for richness AND Dutch-process cocoa powder for tons of pure chocolate flavor.
The fudgy chocolate glaze uses melted semi-sweet chocolate. Feel free to use milk or bittersweet chocolate, if you prefer – just note that this will alter the overall sweetness of the ganache. Learn more about Chocolate in Baking here.
Note: Avoid using chocolate chips in place of freshly chopped baking chocolate, they don’t melt down as smoothly and won’t incorporate into the batter quite as evenly.
The Espresso Powder
Espresso powder helps enhance the chocolate flavor! The hint of espresso enhances the chocolate flavor without actually tasting like coffee.
You can also use strong hot coffee instead. You can also omit it, if preferred.
Use the Right Pan!
This recipe uses a 9.51-inch bundt pan, like this one. If your pan is a little larger, that’s fine, but don’t use a smaller pan as the cake will overflow.
How to Prevent Cheesecake-Filled Chocolate Bundt Cake From Sticking to the Pan
- Coat the bundt pan with melted shortening and work it into every nook and cranny with a silicone pastry brush right before pouring the batter into the pan. If this is done too early, the grease will slide down the sides of the pan and leave you with an uneven coating.
- Alternatively, use Baker’s Joy spray. While I don’t prefer to use nonstick sprays because they can damage the nonstick coating on baking pans over time, Baker’s Joy does work well. It just may reduce the lifetime of your pan.
- Check out my article on How to Prevent Bundt Cake from Sticking for more tips.
How to Store
Store this cake inside an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days. We have not tried freezing this cake.
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Cheesecake Filled Chocolate Bundt Cake
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Ingredients
For the filling:
- 8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 teaspoons all-purpose flour
For the cake:
- 3/4 cup (75 grams) unsweetened cocoa powder, preferably Dutch-processed
- 6 ounces (170 grams) bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
- 1 tablespoon espresso powder
- 3/4 cup (177 grams) boiling water
- 1 3/4 cups (222 grams) all-purpose flour, measured correctly
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 cup (228 grams) sour cream, at room temperature
- 1 1/2 sticks (170 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 2 cups (400 grams) packed light brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon vanilla
- 5 large eggs, at room temperature
For the glaze:
- 1/2 cup (119 grams) heavy cream
- 2 teaspoons corn syrup
- 4 ounces (113 grams) semisweet chocolate, chopped
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Spray a bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray.
For the filling:
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese and sugar until well combined. Add the egg, vanilla, and flour until well combined. Set aside.
For the cake:
- Combine the cocoa, chocolate, and espresso powder in a large bowl. Pour the boiling water into the bowl and cover. Let stand for 5 minutes. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda and set aside.
- Whisk the chocolate mixture until it is smooth. Let cool to room temperature. When it has cooled, whisk in the sour cream.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter, brown sugar, and vanilla for about 3 minutes, or until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, until combined. On low speed, gradually add the flour mixture and the cooled melted chocolate mixture alternatively, beginning and ending with the flour, until the batter is smooth.
- Pour a little more than half the batter into the prepared pan. Pour the cheesecake filling into the center of the batter, not allowing it to touch the edges of the pan. Pour the remaining batter of the filling.
- Bake the cake for about 50 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out with moist crumbs. Let cool on a rack for 10 minutes, then turn the cake out and let cool completely.
For the glaze:
- In a small saucepan, heat the cream and corn syrup over medium heat until hot. Remove from heat and add the chocolate, whisking until smooth. Let cool slightly until thickened. Drizzle over the cake. Let the glaze set at room temperature, about 10 minutes, before serving.
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I do not see the size Bundt pan to use and read comments saying people had theirs overflow. Also can I omit the espresso powder, o one in our family likes coffee. (I know, I know, everyone says you won’t taste it, but coffee drinkers don’t and non coffee drinkers will. I have tasted it in many recipes and friends will say there’s no coffee in this, and the the hostess will say yes there is a bit so….) My question is do I need to sub anything for the espresso powder or just omit it? And the Bundt pan size. Thank you, this looks so delicious!
Hi Deanna! The pan Tessa recommends is linked directly in the recipe card and I’ll link it here for you, too. It’s a 9.51-inch fluted bundt pan. If you already have a bundt pan and it’s smaller than this, we recommend holding back some of the batter, to prevent overflow. As for the espresso powder, it’s there to enhance the chocolate flavor! Lots of our friends and family are non-coffee drinkers who say they do not taste it – but if you prefer, you can leave it out without any other modifications and it’ll still be delicious. Happy baking 🙂
Thank you so much for this amazing recipe! I made it for Father’s Day and it was a huge hit! It did take an extra 15 minutes to bake. I’ll be making this again! A LOT!
wonderfully moist and delicious. I have duck eggs, so I only needed 3 in the cake part. I suspect a lot of commenters here are over mixing, which is causing the overflowed pans. mine did take almost 20 min longer than recipe time, so I used a foil tent to keep the top from burning, and lowered the rack to the bottom after around 60 min, but it still came out lovely.
Well, after an extra 20 min at 300, my cake is done! Came out of the pan perfectly, a big chunk of the inside has the cheesecake layer showing, but its still beautiful! My buddy pan was brand new, but I just ordered the one you recommend and will try it again!
Thank you for the recipe!
I loved the flavor of both the batter and the filling, but I have a brand new bunch pan, and my cake has baked over the edge of the pan, is all over the bottom of the oven, and after 45 min is still real jiggly! The only thing I did different was to weigh out my dry ingredients by the gram. What happened! All I saw was I needed a burnt pan – do they come in different sizes! This cake is quite a bit of work to not have it turn out!
I’m curious about the release effort because of cheesecake. Bundt cakes are notorious for not wanting to release evenly or perfectly…sometimes…no matter how well the pan is prepared. Are there any additional steps to take to ensure a perfect, smooth removal?
Hi Rita! Tessa has a whole article devoted to this topic – check it out here for all Tessa’s best tips on how to prevent bundt cakes from sticking! Hopefully something there will help! Let us know what you think if you give this cake a try 🙂
To keep ANY cake from sticking, I used “Bakers Joy”. Found in grocery stores on the baking isle. Also use it for casseroles or anything baked in oven. Nothing sticks and bakeware washes easy.
About to make this beauty! Any tips on storing it after making it? I figure with cream cheese in there it should be refridgerated? Would love feedback on how to store it and how long it would be good for in the fridge… and whether thawing would be needed?
Thanks!
Hi Yaz! Yes, definitely keep this cake in the fridge, inside an airtight container and/or well wrapped in plastic wrap, to prevent it from drying out as much as possible. It should keep just fine that way for a few days, but we haven’t tested any longer than that, so I can’t say for sure! Pull from the fridge 20 minutes or so before serving, just to take the chill off it a little, for best results. Let us know what you think once you’ve given this cake a try 🙂
I made this and the taste was chocolatey deliciousness. The quantity of the batter overflowed my large bundt pan, so next time I’ll be prepared with a small pan to bake the overflow separately. It came out of the pan perfectly after 10 minutes.
Fantastic cake! I’ll make it again.
This cake is amazingly good. I tried the glaze with honey instead of corn syrup and it came out fine.
I made this today. Turned out great with great chocolaty flavor. Great recipe!
Yay! So happy to hear that, Sarah!!
Any substitute for corn syrup?
We haven’t tried anything else, so I can’t say for sure!