This chocolate mug cake recipe has no eggs and can be made for one or two (if you like to share). It is one of the easiest dessert recipes you’ll ever make and you’ll never make another mug cake again after you try my recipe!
Holy bananas, you guys. This chocolate mug cake recipe is one of your all’s favorite desserts to make.
The simplest chocolate dessert yet incredibly moist, easy, and the best single-serving dessert out there (to share or not to share)!
Mug cake for one or two!
You likely have ALL the ingredients in your pantry already. When you get that late night craving? Or want a small batch dessert (and not whip out a giant baking pan to make brownies to nip that craving)? This chocolate mug cake IS FOR YOU!! If you haven’t made this yet; you are 100% missing out.
The BEST Chocolate Mug Cake recipe out there!
Seriously though, you’re probably so over mug cakes and you’re probably rolling your eyes at me right now but STOP! I promise you this isn’t like any other mug cake out there.
I’ve tried a bunch of mug cakes and I hated them.
I thought they were a really neat concept for a quick dessert fix but nothing would ever beat baking an entire cake or cupcake. I hated that all the mug cakes came out SPONGY and they had the grossest texture.
Last week, I was CRAVING chocolate like none other. It was a pretty dire situation. We didn’t have any desserts in the house because I hadn’t been baking and I didn’t want to run out to get anything so I thought I’d give a mug cake a shot.
It ended up turning into a recipe development hour because the first batch came out horrible. Like, I threw it in the trash can and it was just one lumpy sponge thing.
The second one was slightly better but still really bad. The third, I switched out some ingredients and added a little bit more of some and it came out how I wanted but I knew it could’ve been better so on the fourth try, I finally got it to work and the exact texture I wanted.
What is a mug cake?
I still seem to get this question a lot and a mug cake is literally as it sounds. A cake that is made in a mug!
It’s great because you don’t need to whip out a bunch of tools to make this simple mug cake.
This chocolate mug cake is made without eggs. Why?
Okay, I get asked this a lot too and the reason why this mug cake is made without any eggs is because that is what makes it have a spongey texture!
If you think about it, it makes sense. Why would you put an entire egg into a mug cake when a regular full-sized cake often asks for one or two eggs?
This isn’t a full-sized cake. And of course I’m not going to ask you to divide an egg in half.
Just omit it! Best texture, ever!
Can I make this with self-raising flour?
You can, but I tested it with self-raising flour and it just came out spongey and not the texture I wanted.
I like my cakes light, fluffy, and moist and with the self-raising flour, it just didn’t yield the results I wanted.
There have been many people who have used self-raising flour in this recipe and didn’t notice a difference so if you’re up for the challenge, I say go for it.
Can this mug cake be made in the oven?
No, this was solely developed for the microwave. I have had readers who have baked this but I honestly recall how it turned out and/or what temperature or time.
Are you a visual person? Watch this video below as I walk you through on how to make this chocolate mug cake at home!
If you love mug cakes, you may like these different variations on my chocolate mug cake:
- Dark chocolate mug cake
- Very vanilla mug cake
- Pumpkin spice mug cake
- Salted caramel apple spice mug cake
It’s basically chocolate cake in a mug! Grab your mug and recipe below!
This best and moistest chocolate mug cake you will ever have. It's not spongey or dry like other mug cakes! You will never use another chocolate mug cake recipe again!
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
- 2 tablespoon granulated sugar (you can add 1 tbsp. more if you like it a bit sweeter)
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup + 1 tbsp. milk
- 2 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 1 tablespoon hazelnut chocolate spread or mini chocolate chips
- In a medium bowl, whisk together dry ingredients.
- Whisk in the milk and vegetable oil until all ingredients are combined and batter has no clumps.
- Pour batter into a microwave-safe mug. Mine was a 14-ounce mug. You want enough head space for the cake to rise without pouring over.
Add hazelnut chocolate spread in the middle of the batter or mini chocolate chips. Just drop it in the middle, no need to push it down and sink it in the batter. It does that on its own when it cooks! :)
- Place a paper towel into the microwave and set the mug on top (this is to catch any batter if your mug cake overflows).
- Microwave mug cake for 70 seconds on high (PLEASE READ NOTES CAREFULLY BELOW)
- Carefully remove from microwave and enjoy!
Recipe Video
Please note that ALL microwaves are different therefore can yield different results and can overcook this mug cake if you aren't careful. My microwave is 950 watts and I cooked mine on 100% power for 70 seconds*. Knowing this information, it may help you better judge how long to cook yours for and at what power.
*When this recipe was developed, we were in another house. That microwave in that house took 70 seconds for me to cook the mug cake. When the video was filmed, we were in a new home. In our current microwave, it takes 90 seconds...which is why there are two different times. The fact still remains: all microwaves are different and can yield different cook times, which proves to be true with my two different microwaves in two different homes.
You can totally omit the tablespoon of chocolate hazelnut spread if you want or use a different spread of your choice (peanut butter, biscoff, etc.) or even chocolate chips like I used in the video. I just thought it made the cake even more moist but the cake itself is moist enough without it!
**This recipe is specifically made for the microwave. I developed it for the microwave. I don't know cook time or temperature for an oven...I'd imagine it'd be a very quick cook time at a low temp., but since I didn't test the recipe for an oven, I cannot give specifics. Sorry!
No eggs? Correct. There are NO EGGS in this recipe. Why? Egg is what makes the mug cake spongy. If you think about it, when you bake a full-sized cake, you typically use 1 or 2 eggs...for a mug cake to use 1 egg is A LOT!
Self-rising flour? I have tested this with self-rising and it does NOT work. At least I felt it didn't work because it was too spongy for me. You are more than welcome to use it, however, please keep in mind that I don't recommend this method.
If you're looking for a VANILLA version, here is the link to The Moistest Vanilla Mug Cake recipe!
*Nutrition facts are an estimate and not guaranteed to be accurate.
Thank you for this recipe. I have made this a few times and it truly is the best quick chocolate cake fix. Can’t eat it all at once which just means there is left overs for the next night. It is also the only American recipe that I have ever used that didn’t require the sugar content to be decreased.
Honastly, quite bland. I am much too farmilliar with disgusting mug cakes, but I decided to give it one more try. I followed the recipe very precisely and it came out moist, but much too moist. It was not even cake, it was soup. So I added another 30 seconds and that did the trick. But it was missing a lot of flavor. I even had my spread in there but it just wasn’t sweet. So I added some ice cream on top and it tasted much better.
Wow, first time making a microwaveable mug cake and it exceeded my expectations! It’s a great alternative for when you don’t want to bake. It took me less than 4 minutes to put everything together. I microwaved for 2 mins. Good stuff.
Perfectly delicious! My husband ate the last of the chocolate chips, so yeah there’s that. But even without chocolate chips, this was absolutely heavenly with a dollop of whipped cream. Yum!
Julie,
I made your chocolate mug cakes for dessert tonight. My family loved them!
Best chocolate mug cake I have ever tried! I found this recipe a week ago and have made it twice already for hubby and I. (After kids go to bed treat!) I didnt use anything inside such as hazelnut spread but made a quick chocolate frosting to drop on top. Wonderful!
This is THE best mug cake I have ever had. I found this recipe a week ago and have already made it three times. This is not your average mug cake with the weird texture and undertaste. I use chocolate chips for the melty middle.
It was actually terrible, had a terrible texture and test
Thank you! First recipe I found that I love! Used less cocoa, with peanut butter chips – delish!
The best recipe! Thank you so much! ❤️
Hurrah those of us without a microwave can enjoy this yummy cake too. I put the batter into a slightly bigger ramekin so the mixture was over a bigger surface area than if in a mug or small ramekin. Baked at 200c for about 12mins. The texture and taste was just perfect! Thanks for this great recipe although my waistline may say other wise!!
Heyy, can I at least prepare just the dry mixture before hand, and then save it for later? My mum’s saying that as it has baking powder in it, it might get bad later, just the dry mixture. Help?
You should be able to just prepare the dry ingredients; if you didn’t mix it together with liquid, the baking powder should still be fine.
Used about 4 tbsp brown sugar and a half amount of baking soda because that’s what I had on hand, and it turned out amazing and so moist and gooey, which I never get with other mug cakes that include egg! I did 70 seconds and it looked pretty much done, but when I reached the end of the mug, I found some uncooked batter. I’m not complaining tho, that was probably the best part, it tasted like a lava cake! thanks a ton for the recipe.
All these years later this is still the only mug cake I make. Yum! I don’t like Hazelnut spread so I add peanut butter. I also add chocolate, PB or white chips to the flour. Sometimes mint or caramel chips (in my preference I omit PB spread) So many options to flavor it. BTW – adding chips to the flour before liquid helps coat the chips so they don’t sink them the bottom.
Omg, this is sooooo amazing! Thanks for sharing this recipe. I’ve tried others but this really is the best!
This was so good! I didn’t have the chocolate chips but I made it anyway. 👌👌👌
I have to say, I’ve tested out a lot of Mug Cake recipes and this one I the best by far!!! I’m so happy with the way this one came out. Instead of the chocolate chips I added chocolate chunks and put vanilla frosting on top! YUMMM
OMG this mug cake was amazing! It was really good, not spongey, and was just the BEST MUG CAKE EVER! Also, I actually owned these ingredients, unlike some recipes (Fresh Hazelnuts what the?) But just, WOW. Would recommend!
I made this today using a multipurpose gluten free baking flour for my grandson and I who have to eat gluten free. It was delicious and we will not be missing out tonight while everyone else is having birthday cake at our family game night.
It took like 3 minutes
The texture was perfect but not sweet enough for me. Next time I’ll add more sugar (used two tablespoons.)
First of all, the ones who said it was disgusting can’t be bakers! This was DELICIOUS!! I added a extra tablespoon of sugar and added chocolate chips! OMG! THE BEST! I NEEDED NO ICECREAM. THANK YOU!
Thank you so much for your recipe. Finally no egg! Love the actual cake texture….Did it exactly as the recipe. Turned out wonderful 😍
Made this for my wife, as a special treat for her birthday, but substituted applesauce for the oil, and she LOVES it. Have made it almost every nite since.
Thank you so much.
Aww wonderful!!
Great recipe; this was best far the most “normal” texture i have had in a mug cake recipe.
Oh. My. God. I was dying for some chocolate after eating a bowl of vegetable soup, and my lord- this hit the spot. It is PERFECT. I swapped the milk for vanilla almond milk and it’s the mug cake of my dreams. Thank you thank you THANK YOU.
Very soft and spongy, great rich taste! Some adjustments I tried and worked great: pure oat flour for gluten free, coffee to substitute milk for vegan/milk free version, and omitting choc chips all work
Sadly not the best I’ve ever had. I’m sensitive to vegetable oil flavour and this over powdered me. I then tried it with light olive oil and it was slightly better.
Just not for me sorry
Hi!
I absolutely loved the recipe after reading it. But when I tried it(to a T) my cake is very dense and lumpy.
What do you think could be the problem… less baking powder?
I put it for 90 seconds…so I’m confused since you mentioned it’ll vary with wattage.
Should I increase time or decrease time.
My daughter loves chocolate so she ends up eating just the top moist melted chocochips and leaves the actual cake.
I really want this recipe to work since my hubby and my baby gal both are chocoholics.
Could you try and find a solution.
Thanks a ton!
Dense and lumpy is not a baking powder reaction. Dense and lumpy is likely overmixing. It varies with wattage meaning what your microwave wattage is. So 90 seconds may not work for everyone. I don’t know what you should do because I don’t know your microwave wattage.
In my opinion it was way too oily. Definitely chocolately so good for a chocolate fix but if I make this recipe again I think I will cut back on some of the oil. It might influence the moistness of the cake but that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.
This turned out excellent. Super easy recipe already had everything in my house for it. I added mixed nut butter chocolate chips and coconut flakes and some vanilla extract to the batter and still came out perfect. Thanks for the recipe keep em coming!!!
LOVE this mug cake. It is my go to when I’m craving something sweet and chocolatey, it’s easy to make and my kids love it too. I usually add 1tsp of vanilla extract and I’ve been using mini milk chocolate bars left over from Halloween chopped up instead of the chocolate chips or sometimes i just skip that step, I’ve also made it and then poured Irish cream or rum over it for an indulgent adult treat. Yum!
The texture was terrible, overly moist leaving me feeling like it was raw. I cooked it for a bit longer, but that only made it grainier. Also, when I tried it, it really didn’t taste like much of anything. I even added some vanilla into the mixture, to get a more “classic” chocolate cake taste, but there was almost no taste at all. Completely bland.
Delicious…just what I needed to fill my chocolate craving…I topped it with chocolate chips and Skor chipits too.
Mine came out really good. I added 1 tablespoon of brown sugar and used half and half since I didn’t have milk. I thought it had a little bit of undercooked batter in the bottom but once it cooled a bit more it set and was cooked all the way through. Took a little under 3 mins at 700watts.
This cake is awful. I am not a picky person at all. Normally I’ll eat anything. I had to dump this out after one bite. Very bland and has a weird texture. What a waste of ingredients :(
My son loves German Chocolate cake. I added the chocolate chips and some sweetened coconut flakes prior to microwaving. Topped with a sprinkle more of the coconut and a little Carmel sauce. He said it was by far the best German Chocolate cake he has had. Thank you for the recipe, was well worth the three minutes to make!!!
The recipe reads bake for 70 sec but in the video you say 90 secs. I baked needed to bake it for 120 secs in my microwave and it was perfect.
Yes, I mentioned this in a previous comment. When I developed this recipe, we were living in another house and it took me 70 seconds. When we moved, our new microwave took 90 seconds. I’ll put this into the notes so no one gets confused by this.
I’m back again. I made this ON ACCIDENT without sugar and it was STILL DELICIOUS. So everyone hating on this recipe are clearly WRONG. It’s ok. More mug cake for me.
Just give us the ingredients,faaaaark.. less is best ya know
The recipe is above; you probably missed it because you were too eager to come here to write a snarky comment so you scrolled past the recipe.
It’s so yummy! I made it for Valentine’s Day and it was a success. Thank you for sharing this recipe :)
Incredibly scrumptious, thank you for sharing! Swaps I used that still worked: Coconut oil in lieu of veggie oil & soymilk for regular milk. Threw in a splash of vanilla syrup, a dollop of chocolate sunflower butter for the center, & a sprinkle of powdered sugar to finish. Satisfying!