Chocolate Ricotta Cake

This moist Chocolate Ricotta Cake is so delicious. The ricotta cheese in the cake batter adds richness and gives this bundt cake it's wonderfully soft texture. Keep this recipe in mind for the chocolate lovers in your life- it is sure to become a favorite!

Table of Contents

Ingredients

Find our full ingredient listing at the bottom of this post! Here's a look at the key ingredients.

Sugar
All Purpose Flour (We used White Lily) *Make sure that it is not self rising.
Cocoa not to be confused with hot cocoa mix ;0)
Baking Soda, Baking Powder, and Salt (Unlike many of our recipes, today's recipe calls for more baking soda than baking powder- it isn't a typo!)
Unsalted Butter We use unsalted as the amount of salt in salted butter varies by brand. We prefer to use unsalted & add our salt separately.
Eggs, room temperature (If in a hurry, place eggs in a bowl of warm water for 5 minutes).
RIcotta Cheese (we use whole milk ricotta rather than reduced fat)
Milk (We use whole milk or 2%)
Vegetable Oil (We use canola)
Vanilla Extract
Hot Coffee (Use whatever coffee you like, we used instant espresso.)

How to Make Chocolate Ricotta Cake

This cake uses a version of the reverse creaming method of mixing. If you are unfamiliar with this method, you may notice that the order of ingredients is different than the usual creaming method. (Butter is added to the combined dry ingredients, then eggs, and wet ingredients are added last.) The result is a velvety soft, ultra moist cake. Here's a quick look at our steps!

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour a tube pan or bundt pan. (This recipe makes about 9.5 cups of batter.) See notes.
Add dry ingredients to the bowl of your mixer and mix for one minute to blend (sugar, flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt)
Add butter a few slices at a time and mix until it reaches a crumbly, sandy texture from the butter coating the dry ingredients.

Next, add the eggs, one at a time, mixing at low to medium speed after each until blended. The mixture will become thick.

In another bowl, combine the ricotta cheese, milk, vegetable oil, and vanilla. This is all of your wet ingredients except for the coffee, it will be added to the batter later.
Set a timer for 1 ½ minutes and slowly add the ricotta cheese mixture. Begin on low speed and increase to medium once you've finished pouring.
Next, with the mixer on low speed, slowly add the cup of hot coffee to the batter and mix for about 30 seconds until well blended. The batter will become very thin.

Pouring coffee into chocolate ricotta cake batter.

This recipe makes about 9 ½ cups of batter. Pour into the prepared bundt pan or tube pan and bake.

Pouring cake batter into the prepared cake pan.

Bake for about 50-60 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs attached. Baking times may vary based on your pan, oven, etc. Start checking for doneness as the 50 minute mark approaches and adjust time if needed.

Freshly baked Chocolate Ricotta Cake, cooling in pan.

Chocolate Glaze

This cake is rich and delicious even without a glaze, but we decided to dress our cake up a bit! The chocolate glaze is beautiful, simple to make, and adds another boost of chocolate flavor.

This is a quick ganache glaze that can be prepared in the microwave. It is a combination of chocolate and heavy cream. It cools as it thickens. Once your cake has cooled, you can either spoon it over the cake, or for more control, you can add it with a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away (or a ziplock bag with the corner snipped away.)

Recipe FAQs

Ricotta is a soft cheese with a very mild flavor and a thick texture. Much like our recipes that call for cream cheese or sour cream, you will not actually taste the ricotta in the cake recipe, but it adds richness, moisture, and makes for soft, tender crumb.

Yes! Just as the majority of our cakes from lemon cream cheese pound cake to chocolate bundt cake, sour cream pound cake and more, this cake freezes beautifully.

To freeze the entire cake, allow the freshly baked cake to cool until slightly warm (or room temperature). Then, tightly wrap in plastic wrap followed by foil. It will stay fresh for up to three months!

To thaw, move the cake from the freezer to the refrigerator the day before you need it (still wrapped). Then move it to the kitchen counter the next morning, unwrap, and bring to room temperature.

This cake is fine at room temperature (in an airtight container, under a cake dome, or in a sealed bakery box) for 2-3 days. After that, we recommend moving it to the refrigerator for freshenss.

If you do refrigerate the cake, bring it back to room temperature 2-3 hours before serving so that the cake has time to warm and soften.