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Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

Last Updated On: November 03, 2023 | Published: February 24, 2022 by Melissa Diamond | 11 Comments
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Everybody needs a great go-to Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake recipe and we're so happy to share our favorite with you!

This is such an easy chocolate pound cake to whip up, and the cream cheese in the recipe lends a creaminess, velvety texture, and fine crumb that will keep everyone coming back for just one more slice.

Moist, delicious Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

How to Make Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

You can find our full, printable cake recipe further down in this post- or you can click the "jump to recipe" button at the top of the post. Here is a quick rundown of our steps.

  • Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour a bundt pan.
  • In a medium sized bowl, combine these dry ingredients: cake flour, baking powder, and cocoa powder. Whisk for 30 seconds to blend and set aside.
  • In the bowl of your mixer, add the softened butter and softened cream cheese and mix until smooth. Gradually add the sugar and mix on medium speed for three minutes. Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl.
  • Add the room temperature eggs one at a time, mixing after each until the yellow of the yolk disappears.
  • With the mixer on low speed, add about half of the flour mixture. Gradually increase to medium speed and mix just until combined.
  • Add the milk and vanilla extract. Blend on low speed, then add the remaining flour mixture. Increase the mixing speed slightly and mix just until combined.
  • Pour batter into the prepared bundt pan. Bake for 1 hour and 10 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean or with just a few crumbs attached.
  • Allow to cool in pan on cooling rack for 5-10 minutes. Place cake board or cake plate on top of the bundt pan and flip over to turn out.
Moist Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

What does Cream Cheese do for a Pound Cake?

The cream cheese in this chocolate pound cake recipe adds another layer of richness, a slight tanginess, and ensures that the cake will be wonderfully moist. I love the velvety consistency of this cake recipe!

The thick consistency of the cream cheese also adds a nice denseness that you would expect in a pound cake, but it is not heavy. It is just right!

Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake- So moist, tender, and flavorful!

Easy Chocolate Glaze

We decided to dress up our chocolate cream cheese pound cake with a decadent, yet super easy chocolate glaze.

I love the look, and this chocolate glaze comes together in a matter of minutes! This chocolate glaze is a combination of semi-sweet mini chocolate chips, butter, and corn syrup.

Easy Chocolate Glaze for our Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake! So rich, easy, and delicious!

Simply combine in a microwave safe bowl, heat in small increments until the chocolate is almost completely melted, and stir until the bits of chocolate have finished melting and the glaze is smooth.

Why Mini Chocolate Chips? We used mini chocolate chips because they melt more quickly but you could also use regular chocolate chips.

Applying the Glaze

While I often apply my glaze using a piping bag with the tip snipped away, for this recipe I simply spooned the glaze over the cake and I love the dramatic look.

Consistency of Glaze The glaze will thicken as it cools and so keep an eye on it until it reaches your desired thickness. I did not wait very long after preparing my glaze before applying- just a few minutes.

This Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake is so moist, tender, and delicious!

Recipe FAQs

Yes, just as with most of our cake (from Cream Cheese Pound Cake to Sour Cream Pound Cake, Strawberry Pound Cake and more) this cake freezes beautifully. As long as they are well wrapped, pound cakes stay fresh in the freezer for up to three months!

This is not only perfect for baking well in advance, but it also means that you can have pound cake on standby in the freezer for whenever your pound cake cravings strike or when family or friends drop in!

Wrapping the pound Cake If baking in advance, we like to wrap our pound cakes tightly in plastic wrap, then foil, and into the freezer they go. We even wrap them while they are still slightly warm but this is optional. If you are freezing slices of leftover pound cake, you can wrap them individually in the same way.

Thawing the Pound Cake We prefer to thaw the wrapped cake in the refrigerator the day before we need it. Then, move the kitchen counter the next morning and continue to bring to room temperature.

We love softened cream cheese as an ingredient in cakes! It adds richness and a creamy texture to the cake.

We have lots of layer cakes that call for cream cheese, including white velvet cake, vanilla velvet cake, strawberry cake, and more!

The great thing about pound cakes or bundt cakes is that they are so easy to make and decorating is optional!

However, it is still fun to dress up pound cakes when time allows.

Our favorite glaze for this cake is the easy chocolate glaze mentioned above. We also have a super simple vanilla glaze that we often use with pound cakes and bundt cakes.

A light dusting of powdered sugar tapped through a fine sifter, decorating with (food safe) flowers, or buttercream flowers are great options as well. We have even added stenciling to cakes as with our whipping cream pound cake and Lemon Pound Cake.

Or, skip the decoration altogether and top your cake slices with hot fudge, ice cream, whipped cream, or fresh strawberries!

This cake can be left a room temperature for 2-3 days in an airtight container or under a cake dome.

Other Favorite Pound Cakes

In addition to today's delicious Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake, we have a few more pound cakes that belong on your list of cakes to try!

We just love pound cakes so much and are constantly adding new favorites to our recipes section. Here are just a few more favorites!

Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

More Chocolate Cakes

Calling all chocolate lovers! If you love chocolate cakes, we have so many recipes to share with you!

In addition to todays' amazing Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake, you can find many more of our favorites in our collection of The Best Chocolate Cake Recipes !

Some of our most popular are our easy Brownie Cake, German Chocolate Cake, Chocolate Truffle Cake, and Black Forest Cake!

Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake

BY Melissa and Bebe
This moist chocolate cream cheese pound cake has a tender, velvety, texture with a fine crumb. It is sure to satisfy your chocolate cravings but is not an overly rich chocolate cake. It is delicious! We love to dress it up with a simple chocolate glaze.
Course: Dessert
Servings: 11
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Ingredients

  • 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened (226g)
  • 8 oz cream cheese, softened- use full fat cream cheese (226g) (Brick style rather than in a tub)
  • ½ cup milk (120g)
  • 3 cups sugar (600g)
  • 6 large eggs room temperature
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (4g)
  • 2 cups cake flour (substitution below) (228g)
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder (4g)
  • 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (measure then sift) (82g)

Chocolate Glaze

  • ¾ cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips (I used mini because they melt faster) (132g)
  • 3 Tablespoons butter (43g)
  • 1 Tablespoon light corn syrup (12g)

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour bundt pan. See Notes below.
  • In a medium sized bowl, combine the cake flour, baking powder, and cocoa powder. Whisk for 30 seconds to blend and set aside.
  • In the bowl of your mixer, add the softened butter and softened cream cheese. Mix until smooth. Gradually add the sugar. Mix on medium speed for three minutes. Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl.
  • Add the eggs one at a time, mixing after each until the yellow of the yolk disappears.
  • With the mixer on low speed, add about half of the flour mixture. Gradually increase to medium speed and mix just until combined.
  • Add the milk and vanilla. Blend on low speed, then add the remaining flour mixture. Increase the mixing speed slightly and mix just until well blended. Do not mix over medium speed or over mix.
  • Pour batter into the prepared bundt pan. Bake for 1 hour and 10 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean or with just a few crumbs attached. *Baking times can vary- check on the cake at around the one hour mark and adjust time as needed.
  • Allow to cool in pan on cooling rack for 10 minutes. Place cake board or cake plate on top of the bundt pan and flip over to turn out.

For the Chocolate Glaze

  • Microwave for 20 seconds, stir, 20 seconds, stir, 5 seconds and stir until smooth. **Heating times can vary and so adjust as needed. When the chocolate is nearly completely melted, remove and stir until smooth.
  • Allow to cool to desired thickness for applying to the cake.
  • I spooned the chocolate glaze onto the cooled pound cake. However, if you would like a bit more control, you could spoon the glaze into a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away and pipe onto the cake.

Notes

Substitution for Cake Flour:
1. If you have no cake flour, here is a substitution: For each cup of flour in a recipe, remove 2 Tablespoons of flour and replace with 2 Tablespoons cornstarch (cornflour in the UK). This recipe has 2 cups of flour so you will measure out 2 cups of all purpose flour, remove 4 Tablespoons and replace with 4 Tablespoons cornstarch, whisk to blend.
Bundt Pan Size:
2. We used a 12 cup bundt pan. A bundt pan can be filled to within 1 ¼ inch from the top of the pan to allow for expansion during baking. Otherwise during baking the cake could bake over the pan and onto the oven
*recipe updated 11/23 to add ¼ cup more milk
4.50 from 75 votes (75 ratings without comment)

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11 Comments

  1. Looks delish! I've always made pound cake with cream cheese, it's so yummy! :-) I learned it from my Oma and Mom ;-) Not surprised it was the family favourite LOL

    Reply

  2. I have to make this one! It's calling my name with a Chocolate Ganache Icing & slap a few candied strawberries on top! I'm in love with this cake!????

    Reply

  3. I am just now learning about the reverse creaming method, and was wondering if this method would work for this chocolate cream cheese pound cake? If so, could you do a quick rundown of the steps (especially when the cream cheese would be added)? Thanks so much for your respons.

    Reply

  7. Hi Ann, We have not used cream cheese in a vanilla pound cake though we plan to do so soon. Below are links to a sour cream pound
    cake and a whipping cream pound cake that you might like. They can be baked in a bundt pan as well as a tube pan. Keep an eye on the cakes as the baking time may be different if using a different pan.

    https://www.mycakeschool.com/recipes-tutorials/sour-cream-pound-cake/

    https://www.mycakeschool.com/whipping-cream-pound-cake/

    Reply

  8. Would it be possible to thaw frozen cream cheese and place it in the batter before baking, or would that component ruin the whole dessert

    I would be greatful for any response. Thank you.

    Reply