Chocolate Root Beer Bundt Cake
This Chocolate Root Beer Bundt Cake has been all over the internet. I have seen it on more than one blog. But after someone proclaimed it a recipe worth buying a cookbook for, my interest was piqued. Prior to reading that comment, it had sounded intriguing, but not intriguing enough to make it to the top of my must-bake list.
So I headed to Trader Joe’s to get some root beer. If I was going to make a cake with root beer in it, it was going to be some good root beer. I came home with a four-pack and then got distracted. A couple days later when I recommitted to making the cake, all the root beers were gone. Silly Hubby – he thought I got those for him. Once I got more root beer, I hid enough for the recipe in the back of the fridge.
A couple days later, I finally got around to making this cake. Although, I think the name is misleading. I didn’t get a root beer taste at all from this cake. Even when I sat and thought about root beer while eating it. I was trying so hard to make it taste like root beer, but I just couldn’t taste it.
I asked a few people at work about what the cake tasted like and I got a variety of answers including comments about chocolate, super moist, really awesome, but nothing about root beer. I do agree with my coworkers, this is a moist chocolatey bundt cake. And just look at that thick layer of frosting. How could anything be sub-par with that much frosting on top?
Has anyone else out there made this cake? Did you think you could taste the root beer?
One Year Ago: Pumpkin Pancakes with Cranberry Compound Butter and America’s Test Kitchen Food and Friends – Rack of Lamb Dinner Party
Two Years Ago: Cranberry Sauce
Three Years Ago: Pumpkin Pasta and Pumpkin and Chocolate Caramel Corn
Four Years Ago: Ginger Pumpkin Cupcakes and Halloween M&M Treats
Five Years Ago: Shark Cupcakes and Lemon Berry Muffins
Chocolate Root Beer Bundt Cake
This moist chocolate bundt cake has a serious layer of chocolatey frosting
Yield: 12-15 servings
Ingredients:
For the Cake
2 cups root beer (not diet)
1 cup dark cocoa powder
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cubed
1 1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 cups flour
1 1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp kosher salt
2 large eggs, room temperature, lightly beaten
For the Frosting
2 ounces (about 1/3 cup) dark chocolate, melted and cooled slightly
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tsp kosher salt
1/4 cup root beer
2/3 cup dark unsweetened cocoa powder
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
Directions:
For the Cake
In a small saucepan, melt together the root beer, cocoa powder, and butter over medium heat until the butter is melted and the mixture is smooth. Add in the sugars and whisk until they are completely dissolved, then remove the pan from heat and allow to cool slightly.
Meanwhile, in a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt.
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F and generously spray the inside of a 10-inch bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray, or butter it, dust with flour, and tap out any excess flour.
Once the chocolate/root beer mixture has cooled, whisk in the beaten eggs.
Gently pour the chocolate mixture into the flour mixture, and fold everything together until well combined. The batter will be slightly lumpy, but don’t overbeat it.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 35-40 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through the baking time, until a small sharp knife or long toothpick/skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a wire rack to cool completely, then gently loosen the sides of the cake from the pan and turn it out onto a large plate.
For the Frosting
Beat the butter and melted chocolate together with a stand or hand mixer, then, on slow speed, beat in the salt, root beer, and powdered sugar, until shiny and smooth.
Use a spatula to spread the fudge frosting over the crown of the bundt cake in a thick layer, then place the cake in the fridge for 10 minutes or so to allow the frosting to set before serving.
You can place the cake in an airtight container overnight if you want to make the cake the day before.
Recipe from Baked, as seen on Crepes of Wrath
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
These look fantastic and are so festive!
Oh my, these look divine! I recently made something similar, but with no chocolate – just a pumpkin batter with cream cheese topping. But I definitely think I must try these too.
These are absolutely beautiful!
Look wonderful!
These look awesome. I just wish it made a bigger pan!
They’re pretty rich, but I would imagine you could just double it and make it in a 9×13 pan if you wanted!
I made pumpkin spice brownies on Friday and they were delish so I bet these are EVEN BETTER! Thanks for sharing and I’ll be following your tweaks!
~ingrid
i always make a pumpkin cheesecake in the fall with a ginger cookie crumb crust, but i’m liking the chocolate component in your recipe even more.
oh yum – love pumpkin, and the chocolate/pumpkin combo looks wonderful!
These look great! Is there a way I can make them non-dairy? Something I can sub the cream cheese for? Thanks!
Heather – I’ve had great luck subbing Tofutti Better than Cream Cheese in cheesecake recipes in the past. I think that would definitely work and you could use Earth Balance in the brownie portion. Let me know how it turns out if you try it.
Hi Jenn! I just wanted to let you know that you won the giveaway on my blog last week. I emailed you, but never got a response. Could you email me your mailing address to jennharton@paducah.com. I have to pass it along to myblogspark so they can send you your prize package!
Thanks, Jen…I’ll let you know how they come out!
OH wow these do look delicious! I love all that swirled pumpkin…yum!
Those look amazing!
Wow, I love these! My husband would die of happiness of I made these for him – pumpkin cheesecake is his favorite thing for fall.
They look like tiger fur – very cool! What an interesting flavour combination.
We love these at my house! I like your idea of dark chocolate – I will have to try that next time.
beautiful! And they look so delicious!! I agree I don’t normally think of pumpkin with chocolate… but you have me convinced!
The tops of these are a work of art! Love it!
Three of my favorite thi ngs in one dessert! Chocolate and pumpkin and cheesecake! How perfect…
~Nancy
Three of my favorite thi ngs in one dessert! Chocolate and pumpkin and cheesecake! How perfect…
~Nancy
hi.. just dropping by here… have a nice day! http://kantahanan.blogspot.com/
The side-view shot totally won me over. These look delicious!
This looks so yummy.
I now know what to make for the office potluck!
Those look amazing. I love pumpkin with chocolate, I plan on making these soon.
Your brownies look delicious! I am curious since I would like mine to taste more like pumpkin pie than plain pumpkin should i add pumpkin pie spices or follow your recipe for the spices?
Thanks!
fawkes – There are a decent amount of spices in the pumpkin portion of the batter. I would recommend making is as the recipe states, then taste it before you pour it into the pan. Maybe then add some pumpkin pie spice if you’d like.
I made these over the weekend and they were scrumptious!! I’m not a huge fan of pumpkin but this recipe is now a fall staple. I plan on making them for the family on Thanksgiving…thanks for sharing this!
I made these the other day and they were great! a hit at work! yum! thanks!
I stumbled across your blog from a Facebook friend and made these brownies last night. DELICIOUS!! I doubled the recipe and it does just fit in a 9×13 pan and took about 60 mins to bake. It’s worth the wait for them to be chilled in the fridge. The flavors are even more delicious that way.
Oh YUM! And gorgeous, to boot. I never thought pumpkin and chocolate go together either, until I tried it! 🙂 Now I’m hooked. Good idea to double up on the cheesecake layer…you can never have enough pumpkin cheesecake after all!
Thank you so much for participating in our event! These brownies look amazing. They say Halloween to me for sure!
I made these– now I love them! Will be repeated each fall 🙂
Amazing! I loved these so much I played with them a bit and made cranberry cheesecake brownies for my christmas baking.(I didn’t stumble on to these till christmas.) I’ll let you know when I put those up on my blog! With credit to you of course!
Lexi – cranberry cheesecake brownies sound very intriguing. Can’t wait to see them.
Hi Jen! I made these for Heather@BFM’s (comment listed above) birthday and she loved them! Unfortunately I could not find the Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa powder (I tried 3 stores) so I had to make them with the regular cocoa powder. Can you tell me where you found the Hershey’s Special Dark??
Kasey – I have actually had a hard time finding it as well. I had actually all but given up on it until one day it caught my eye at the grocery store. I proceeded to buy all three containers. I would say just keep an eye out for it and good luck!
1/2 cup of flour seems like very little. Is that correct?
Pup – Yes, that is the correct amount of flour. Most brownie batters have very little flour in them.
Just made these- delicious! I only had the milk chocolate powder, so I’m excited to try it again with the special dark powder.
I doubled the recipe and it perfectly filled a 13×9 pan so you might try it. 🙂 And they are amazing. Also I used margerine not butter and found they were more moist. Happy Baking!
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I made these with my nieces and over all they were pretty good, but something about the pumpkin part tasted off. Still, fun and festive to make!