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Say hello to the BEST chocolate sheet cake recipe!!! Supremely moist, fudgy, and full of decadent chocolate flavor! But the best part? This cake is so easy!!!
Chocolate Sheet Cake
I come from a long line of chocolate lovers. And it feels like there’s always some celebration popping up that calls for chocolate cake! Luckily, I have a ton of chocolate cake recipes in my repertoire.
But most of them are pretty time consuming and involve stacking multiple layers, etc. Which is fine if you have all day to bake and assemble! But what about when you don’t?!
Well, that’s where this chocolate sheet cake comes into the picture! AKA Texas Sheet Cake! It’s a rich, moist, chocolate cake that’s baked in a sheet pan and topped with fudgy chocolate frosting. It’s so easy, so delicious, and so perfect for celebrations! Seriously… this cake can serve a crowd!
P.S. If you love sheet cakes, try my Simple Banana Sheet Cake Recipe next!
Tips and Tricks for Recipe Success:
- Be sure to preheat your oven to 350 degrees well before you plan on baking! Most ovens take at least 30 minutes to fully preheat!
- To get the richest chocolate flavor, this recipe calls for chopped chocolate and cocoa powder. Be sure to use high-quality chocolate – such as Lindt or Ghirardelli – for the chopped chocolate. And unsweetened cocoa powder. Not dutch-process!
- Be sure to scoop and level your cocoa powder and flour when measuring. Don’t pack them into the measuring cup!
- This recipe calls for a combination of granulated sugar and light brown sugar. Be sure to pack the brown sugar into the measuring cup before adding it to the recipe.
- You’ll use whole eggs and egg yolks for this cake. You may discard the leftover egg whites, or place them in an airtight container and store them in the fridge for another use! I like to save mine and make an omelette!
- To make this cake “stick to your fork” moist, you’ll need sour cream, whole milk, oil, and butter. If you cannot find sour cream, I think full-fat Greek yogurt would make a fine substitute. And if you don’t want to use canola oil, you may use melted refined coconut oil.
- You’ll also use 1 cup of HOT coffee! However you may use hot water, if you prefer. The important part is to use HOT liquid. This helps bloom the cocoa powder, which helps break up any remaining lumps in the batter. And releases flavor particles from the cocoa powder.
- Since this recipe uses melted butter, you don’t need a stand mixer or hand held mixer. You may use a large bowl and a spatula to bring this simple cake together.
Be sure to bake the cake just until a cake tester comes out clean. About 45 minutes usually does the trick! But if your oven runs hot, you may want to check around 38 minutes!
More Chocolate Cake Recipes:
- Salted Caramel Chocolate Cake
- Grand Marnier Molten Chocolate Cakes
- Chocolate Raspberry Cake
- Red Wine Chocolate Cake
- Death by Chocolate Cake
- Super Decadent Chocolate Cake
- Chocolate Zucchini Cake
If you try this recipe for Chocolate Sheet Cake, let me know! Leave a comment below and don’t forget to snap a pic and tag it #bakerbynature on instagram! Seeing your kitchen creations makes my day.
The Best Chocolate Sheet Cake
Ingredients
For the Chocolate Sheet Cake:
- 3 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, finely chopped
- 1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter
- 1/3 cup melted coconut oil, canola oil, or vegetable oil
- 1 cup cocoa powder
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup light brown sugar, packed
- 1 and 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs + 1 large egg yolk, at room temperature
- 1 cup sour cream
- 1/4 cup whole milk
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup freshly brewed coffee or freshly boiled water
For the Chocolate Frosting:
- 1 cup (8 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 2 cups confectioners’ sugar
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1 and 1/2 Tablespoons heavy cream
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 6 ounces (170g) quality dark chocolate, melted and cooled for 10 minutes
- Chocolate sprinkles, optional
Instructions
For the Chocolate Sheet Cake:
Preheat oven to 350°(F). Generously spray a 9x13-inch baking pan with non-stick spray and set aside until needed.
- In a large glass bowl, microwave the chocolate, butter, and oil in 30 second increments, stirring between each increment, until butter and chocolate are completely melted. Whisk smooth and set aside.
- In a large bowl combine cocoa powder, both sugars, flour, baking soda, and salt until ingredients are thoroughly combined. Set aside.
- In a separate large bowl, combine the eggs, yolk, sour cream, milk, and vanilla, beating until well combined.
- Pour in the chocolate mixture and stir until combined. Add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredient mixture and mix until just combined.
- Carefully add in hot coffee (or water) and let sit for 1 minute. Then gently stir until completely combined. The batter will be very thin.
- Pour batter into pan and smooth the top. Bake in preheated oven for 38 to 45 minutes, or until wooden toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center of a cake comes out clean or with just a few moist crumbs attached.
- Place cake on a cooling rack to cool completely. Once cool, spread frosting on top of cake.
For the Chocolate Frosting:
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, or in a large bowl using a handheld electric mixer, beat the butter on medium-speed until completely smooth. Reduce the speed to low and gradually add in the confectioners' sugar, beating until all of the sugar is completely combined. Add in the salt, cream, and vanilla extract and beat smooth.
- Add in the melted chocolate and beat smooth. Once all of the ingredients have been incorporated, increase the speed to medium-high and beat for a minute.
- Spread frosting on top of the cooled cake. Top with chocolate sprinkles, if desired.
This chocolate cake is yum-town. Super ooey gooey chocolatey yum yum. Divine. I fell in love w it from the pictures on IG and then saw that there was dark chocolate used and I wept tears of pure joy. I made it w my best friends as a little introduction to baking and it sure introduced them! We all agreed that the full blog post absolutely should be read! Especially the tips!
Now to the recipe:
We opted for the sour cream, hot coffee, ghiradelli chocolates, and canola oil combination. An absolute must try. The coffee gives it the deepness and really compliments the chocolate. Using the ghiradelli baking chocolate and ghiradelli chips, it gave the cake a unique richness and that crave able, almost floral-like cocoa palate. Definitely worth the extra cents for higher quality chocolate.. Especially for a cake where a good portion of the recipe is true melted chocolate!
The cake came out dreamy and perfectly balanced w sweetness and richness. U absolutely should use the semi-sweet and dark chocolate combo due to the dairy element. It balances out the acidic quality of the chocolate that is more on the bitter side in a perfect marriage of soft and sweet and rich and deep. Also, only thing is: we had a whole bunch of frosting that couldn’t fit on the cake? Not sure why, maybe I frosted it too lightly or accidentally used more butter than I needed to? Regardless, we are now rationing off the leftover frosting tub for good deeds in the household.
Thank you bakerbynature for this incredible recipe. I can’t wait to try more, maybe I can butter them up (wink wink) to try the pecan blondies next! Ily.
I had way too much frosting also and wondered if the recipe was for two sheet cakes or something. I couldn’t use it all. I also wonder if a larger pan should have been used. My cake was a lot thicker than a normal sheet cake. Perhaps the 9×13 pan was incorrect.
However the cake was sooo good and everyone loved it!
I am planning on making these cake for my son’s birthday but I am thinking of using a 9 inch round cake pan!
Do you think I need all the mixture or should I use less?
Looks yummy! Would using melted cocoa butter instead of the oil add a little something to it, or make it dry instead?
We haven’t tested it with cocoa butter, so I cannot say how this substitution would work out. But if you give it a go, we’d love to hear the results 🙂
This cake was amazing. Followed the cake recipe exactly and it came out perfectly. I decided to make half the frosting based on previous reviews and even that was very generous so I would definitely suggest halving the frosting for a heavily frosted cake. I will make 1/3 of the frosting next time as we prefer more cake and a thinner layer of frosting. Good quality chocolate is expensive so hopefully this helps others gauge how much to make. The frosting itself is delicious, smooth and easy to spread. The only other thing that would be helpful is if recipes included weight measurements as I weigh all my ingredients for accuracy but I just googled the ingredient weights and went from there. Will make this again and again, it is wonderful!
I agree about using weigh measurements and not cup measurements.
Hi, I have self raising flour would I put the same amount recipe recalls? And deduct the raising agents?
Is the dark chocolate in the frosting
Unsweetened baking chocolate?
You can use unsweetened if you want a VERY deep chocolate flavor. I typically use dark chocolate that’s 70% cocoa.
This cake looks amazing! Did you use natural cocoa or dutch processed? Thank you!
I think it said in the tips NOT dutch processed cocoa. Based on my experience making the Americas test kitchen choc sheet cake recipe that calls for DP cocoa, I will prob never make another cake if it calls for DP AND melted choc…it turned out WAY too chocolatey.
Hi! Could I make this as a layer cake or would it not be stable enough???
Hello! Did you end up making it as a layer cake? because I want to use this recipe for a layer cake too!
I just made this and it’s amazing! I used a 10×16 inch pan instead and baked it for 38 minutes and it came out perfectly. Super soft texture! I halved the frosting recipe and with just half it was the perfect amount. Thank you so much for another amazing recipe!
Can you use bittersweet chocolate instead of semisweet??
Hi! My son’s birthday is coming up and due to corona virus I am planning on making his birthday cake. I want to use a 9 inch round baking pan. Do you think I should do less time in the oven? Should I use less of the mixture?
I made this sheet cake yesterday. One of the most delicious, moist cakes I’ve made.
I tried this recipe, but my cake got a dome the middle and some wide cracks ☹️ Do you know why that must have happened?
Hi NK. Sorry to hear this! Could be from over mixing the batter (which allows too much air in and causes the batter to rapidly rise in the oven) or your oven could run a little hot.
In 1 cup of water, how much coffee powder should I add ?
This looks so yummy! Do you think I could bake this in a large baking sheet? 12X18?
I have the same question…I may try to double it
Can you let me know how it turned out? When I adjust a 9×13 to a 12×17, I adjust to 1.75 of the original recipe but because some listed this as a thick cake, I wondered if I should just leave as the original proportions?
Oh wow, what a lovely cake! Moist and fluffy crumb with perfect frosting. Yes there was a bit left over, but I froze it for future use. I plan to make a few “mixes” of the dry ingredients and store in ziplock bags ready to make. Thank you for sharing!
Hi can I use sweetened cocoa powder?
Hi
This looks so good ! Planning to make it today ! Can I use almond milk instead of whole milk ? Do you think that would work ?
TIA
Anisha
AMAZING OMG. The most perfect chocolate cake ever!!!!I used oat milk instead of whole milk, as well as putting a mix of chopped milk and dark chocolate inside the regular cake batter, which I HIGHLY recommend.
This is just an amazing recipe! Used it to make my daughters cake. Everyone loved it. The moisture in the cake is perfect and along with the frosting it just takes it to the next level.
I’m so happy to hear that, Sheree!
Hi Ashley! I was looking over this recipe and a few of your other chocolate recipes and they look AMAZING!!! I wanted t know what the difference is between this one, the “Death by Chocolate Cake” and the “Super Decadent Chocolate cake” and which one of the three is your favorite!
Hey,
I love this cake, I mean I really love this cake but I can’t make it when I’m at other people’s house because they don’t have measuring cups. Please can we have recipe in metric aswell? I know i can google the converts but it always ends up being completely different when i try to do that. Thank you so much for this recipe.
Hi! I made this cake over the holidays. Took to a Christmas Day gathering. It was a BIG hit! Sooo darn good, and thankfully… so easy! Many thanks for this wonderful recipe!
This is truly divine! Whole family loved it! Thanks for sharing this recipe!
May I use instant coffee?
Absolutely delicious! Halved the recipe and made it in an 8×8 cake tin. So moist and fluffy. And the frosting is just incredible. Thank you so much for this recipe.
I follow you on Instagram and love all that I see! I needed a chocolate cake recipe for my son’s birthday, but he requested cupcakes. I took this exact recipe, filled 24 cupcake liners, and baked for 18 minutes. They were delicious! Simple, yummy recipe that I could make with my kids. Thank you!
Perfect ! My lover loved his bday cake !
I used this recipe and put it in a 12 x 12 pan and it worked perfectly. I adjusted the baking time but by watching the cake and checking for doneness. It is a delicious cake and the icing is dreamy, silky and fabulous. Great cake. I am going to use it again today and make two 9 inch rounds. This is definitely going into the favourite recipe file. I love the texture from the real chocolate as opposed to a cocoa only recipe.
This is a super chocolatey, moist cake that I will make over and over again. Takes just a little more effort than my usual go to chocolate cake but tastes so much better. Looked at the comments and halved the icing recipe as suggested.Turned out perfect!!!!
Super easy, super moist and super delicious!!!!
Can this be made in a round or bunt cake pan.
Amazing!
Hi Ashley! Really want to bake this Chocolate Sheet Cake but would you mind giving the measurements in grams? This will help a lot!
Thanks 😀
No words to describe it!
The best chocolate cake and at the first attempt.
So easy, so moisty and so flavorfull…
Surely came to stay.