Mistakes Everyone Makes With Chocolate Lava Cake

A soft sponge with a gooey molten center, chocolate lava cake might be a throwback to the '90s but it's one we want to stick around. At its best, it has a perfectly melty middle and is as rich and extravagant as you want from a showstopper dessert. But it's easy to make errors with chocolate lava cake that make it disappointing. Rather than an oozing center, you can be left with one that has no movement and is basically just sponge cake. Or, maybe you go to turn out your cake only to find it stuck in the mold.

All these issues and more are common with chocolate lava cake, so don't let it dishearten you. As a food writer with professional baking experience, I know my way around a melting middle. However, I wanted to get more tips and advice, so I interviewed four baking experts to learn their best-kept molten cake secrets.

Armed with their knowledge, we're about to look into the mistakes everyone makes with chocolate lava cake. From getting that perfect flowing center to making sure the taste is on point, there's lots to learn from our experts. So, next time you attempt a lava cake, you can expect more consistent results. However, it's still the kind of dessert that can take some trial and error to get right.

Some people think that a lava cake is just a regular cake that's underbaked in the middle. However, this isn't the proper technique for getting that molten core. Sure, you don't want to overbake this kind of dessert, but if you're attempting to get a gooey center just from a short baking time, you're making a mistake.

Trung Vu, chef-instructor of Pastry & Baking Arts at the Institute of Culinary Education's New York City campus, sets us straight on this common misconception. "This is a highly inconsistent way of producing or reproducing this cake due to variables such as oven temperatures, ingredient or batter temperatures, and the many differences in localized ingredients," Vu tells us. "Not only that, but it is not the best idea to undercook cake batter that may contain egg, flour, and other ingredients that need to reach a certain temperature to be safe to consume," he adds.

Rather than getting a soft center from undercooking your cake, it should come from a scoop of ganache in the middle. You make a classic chocolate ganache and then chill it until it becomes scoopable. A spoonful of this goes inside the batter before baking. This way, when it heats up, you have a beautiful liquid chocolate center that tastes amazing — much better than runny, undercooked cake batter.

The clue's in the name — chocolate lava cake is all about chocolate. In baked goods, it can sometimes fall flat, but you want something rich and intense from this dessert. And our experts all agree that the quality of chocolate used is vital. While some recipes may call for chocolate (rather than cocoa powder) in the batter, all of them use chocolate for the ganache. This is where the type of chocolate used is important.

"The best chocolate to use for chocolate ganache is couverture," explains chef and cooking instructor Trung Vu. This is a type of chocolate that's richer in cocoa butter and therefore better for melting into ganache. Vu recommends a quality brand with a high cocoa butter percentage, such as Ghirardelli or Lindt. He notes that using low quality or non-couverture chocolate can lead to a grainy consistency in your ganache or a center that doesn't flow as it should.

The cacao percentage is also important, according to Davide Negri, executive chef of the DeQuattro Restaurant Group, which owns five restaurants, including Pane e Vino in Providence, Rhode Island. Negri tells us that the cacao percentage directly impacts the cake's flavor.

"The higher the percentage, the richer the taste," he says. "I typically use 65% cacao but experiment with different types and brands of chocolate." A higher percentage usually means more flavor.

You might think that ganache is ganache — it's all the same. However, it's not quite that simple. You need the right ratio for chocolate ganache – and it's not the same for every type. Some is thin and pourable, while other types are solid enough to roll into truffles.

"I typically use an ordinary ganache, which is one part heavy cream to one part dark chocolate, but decreasing the cream will slow down the flow," Institute of Culinary Education's Trung Vu tells us. Balance is what you need here. If it's too thin, you won't be able to scoop it into the center of your batter, but if it's too thick, the middle might not be as freely flowing as you want it to be.

You also have to think about the type of chocolate that you're using. To get the same consistency as a ganache made with a 1-to-1 ratio of dark chocolate and heavy cream, you need to use more milk or white chocolate. The equivalent ratios for milk chocolate are 1.5-to-1 chocolate to cream, or 2-to-1 chocolate to cream for white chocolate. Even so, a ganache made using these ratios won't be scoopable right away. You may need to chill it to stop it from being too runny to handle.

Although all chocolate lava cake recipes can have different methods, many involve whipping up eggs and then folding in the dry ingredients. Jennifer Luxmoore — a professional baker and owner of Sin Bakery in Providence, Rhode Island — warns against folding the dry ingredients in too vigorously, as this can lead to issues with your finished cakes.

If you knock all the air out of the whipped eggs, the batter will lack volume and won't rise as well as it should. This can leave you with flat or dense cakes. However, there's also such a thing as not mixing it well enough. This can leave lumps of unmixed flour in the batter and can make the finished dessert dense or crumbly.

"Many times the chocolate isn't fully incorporated, or it's beaten too much and you lose the 'fluff' of the egg mixture," Luxmoore notes. So, you need to find a balance between too much and not enough. Fold the dry ingredients into the egg slowly using a rubber spatula. Do it gently to avoid knocking the air out. Stop as soon as you no longer see streaks of flour and cocoa in the mixture.

According to Eva Wong — the executive pastry chef at The Armory Hotel in Bozeman, Montana — not mixing the batter properly is a common mistake people make with lava cakes. Both overmixing and undermixing are regular missteps and each causes its own kinds of issues.

Overmixing cake batter can cause dense, chewy cakes. When you mix too much, you overwork the flour and develop too much gluten. Gluten is great for bread — giving it that satisfying chew — but it's not something you want too much of in cakes. Instead of a light and tender crumb, you'll end up with something rubbery. Overmixing can also incorporate too much air into the batter, causing the cake to rise unevenly or collapse as it cools.

On the other hand, undermixing batter has its own set of issues. If the ingredients aren't properly combined, you might find pockets of unmixed flour or streaks of butter in your finished cake. Not only does this lead to uneven texture and flavor, but those unmixed ingredients can also disrupt the cake's structure. A poorly mixed batter won't trap air effectively, so it ends up denser and flatter. To avoid either issue, mix just until everything is combined. Scrape down the sides of the bowl to catch all the dry ingredients, but resist the urge to keep going once the batter looks smooth.

Lava cakes are cooked in small molds or tins, then turned out of them prior to serving. As such, it's essential that they don't get stuck. You can bake a perfect lava cake, but if you can't get it out of the mold, it's effectively a failure. Not properly greasing the tins is a common mistake, and one that can end up in mess and disappointment.

"If you don't spray a mold well enough, the lava cake can get stuck when releasing," explains pastry chef Eva Wong. In fact, all our experts talk about the importance of properly greasing your molds, though everyone has a different technique. Cooking spray and butter are both valid options, so use whichever you prefer or have to hand.

"I like to spray with oil based spray and then dust with chocolate powder to ensure that the cake comes out easily when done," says Wong. Jennifer Luxmoore of Sin Bakery also opts to add cocoa after greasing. This helps avoid any ungreased spots. "Any spots I've missed won't have cocoa on them, so I'll go back and add in some more butter to these spots and also dust them with a bit more cocoa," she notes.

There's more science behind chocolate lava cake than you might imagine. There's not all that much room for error if you want to get an oozing molten center but a perfectly cooked exterior. One of the ways you achieve this is by cooking in a hotter oven than you'd usually bake a cake in. It's a big part of what helps achieve the perfect texture.

"The secret to a perfect lava cake lies in combining high temperature with a shorter baking time," executive chef Davide Negri tells us. "Cook it too long, and you'll lose the lava," he notes. But why a high temperature and a quick cooking time? Why not just cook it lower for longer? That's where the science part comes in. When you cook in a hot oven — around 450 degrees Fahrenheit — the outside of the cake cooks quickly and sets. This heats the center so that it's safe to eat, even if it isn't fully cooked.

Timing is everything with chocolate lava cake. Cook it too long and you just have a regular cake, albeit in a single serving. The ganache in the center will seize up and you won't have that beautiful flow of liquid chocolate. Don't cook it long enough and it won't have any structural integrity. Neither option is good and because you're cooking small, individual desserts, it only takes a minute or two to go from underbaked to overbaked.

"While overcooking is easier to spot — a clean toothpick is a clear sign that you have overcooked — an undercooked cake is tricker to spot until you've removed it from its pan," Davide Negri explains. "The biggest indicator that you've undercooked your cake is that it will immediately collapse as soon as it's removed from the ramekin."

Exactly how to avoid getting the timing wrong is a trickier thing. The obvious answer is to stick to the time given in the recipe. This should yield good results in theory. But, in practice, there are a lot of variables involved in baking and you can do everything according to the recipe and still end up with desserts that aren't cooked properly.

You may be able to tell by looking at it. "You want the cake to just lose the glossy look and start to have small cracks," says baker Jennifer Luxmoore. She says that large cracks are a sure sign of overbaking.

There are times when you might mix your batter and then chill it, perhaps because you get called away to another task or because you want to make the batter ahead of time then cook it after dinner. Or you might even make the batter well in advance and freeze it. Batter can also end up cold because you used ingredients straight out of the fridge. This is all fine, but you have to take the temperature of your batter into account and acknowledge how it might affect your finished dessert.

All of our experts agree that chilling the batter increases the length of time it takes to cook. Refrigerated batter might only take an extra minute or two in the oven, while frozen batter could add five to 10 minutes to the cook time. Pastry chef and instructor Trung Vu advises that frozen lava cake batter should always be cooked from frozen, even if it complicates the cook time. This is because "many recipes incorporate a meringue (whipped egg whites and sugar) for a lighter cake texture, but meringues usually separate or break when defrosted," he explains. There's no precise formula for telling how much longer it will take to cook a chilled or frozen batter, so you have to look for visual cues.

You might think that if you follow the recipe precisely and look up every troubleshooting tip, your chocolate lava cake will come out perfect the first time. But it's a mistake to assume this — one that can lead to disappointment. Lava cake can be fussy, and even our experts admit that there's some trial and error involved when following a new recipe on the initial try.

The trouble is all the factors that can change the outcome of the recipe. "The timing of baking the perfect lava cake can have other variables, such as the vessel you're cooking the cakes in and the temperature of the batter," says Trung Vu. "Since lava cakes are usually individual cakes, the best thing to do is bake a single tester ahead of time and keep the conditions the same for when you bake the rest," he advises.

Chef Eva Wong also suggests baking one or two tester cakes and seeing how they flow before baking the rest of the batch. Some adjusting of the timing can be necessary to get the best results. "I don't recommend making your first lava cake for friends at a dinner party or for a loved one during a special occasion without trying out the recipe first," she says. But even the so-called mistakes will be tasty, she admits, so play around and enjoy the ride.

You've baked your lava cake and it's gone well, now it's time to serve them up. If you let them sit around before plating and serving them, you're making a mistake. For the best results, they should be eaten right away. Reheating them is also an option, but you're more likely to overbake them this way.

"Chocolate lava cakes are best enjoyed when they are hot, so they are either served a la minute (immediately upon baking) or can be reheated in a hot oven for several minutes," pastry chef and instructor Trung Vu tells us. According to Jennifer Luxmoore of Sin Bakery, it can also be tougher to unmold your desserts if you leave them sitting around for too long after baking.

So, turn your lava cakes out as soon as possible after baking and serve them immediately to enjoy them at their best, with warm sponge and a flowing center. They cook quickly, so you can prepare the batter before dinner, pop it in the fridge, and bake when you're ready.

Lava cake is often served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. It provides a pleasant contrast to the intense chocolate flavor and the warmth of the dessert. But plating it with a scoop of ice cream right on top is a mistake. There are other, better ways to serve this pairing.

"Serving lava cakes with ice cream can be a crowd-pleaser, but be mindful that the warm cake can melt ice cream too quickly," says Trung Vu. He suggests serving the ice cream on the side, instead, so the warmth of the cake doesn't melt it instantly. The same goes for whipped pastry cream, which Davide Negri sometimes serves lava cake with — the heat of the cake can melt it, so serving it on the side is a better option.

Both Negri and Vu suggest serving something crunchy with lava cake and ice cream. Both of these are soft, so a crunchy thing adds some contrast. Vu says that even something as simple as crushed Oreos is delicious. However, nuts, granola, or a baked streusel type of topping are other options. A dusting of icing sugar and fresh fruit are also delicious additions when serving.