Chocolate Pudding Cake Recipe & Video

When you make a Chocolate Pudding Cake, you do not need an electric mixer, everything is mixed by hand. There are two parts to this recipe, the cake and the pudding sauce. Let's begin with the pudding sauce which means stirring instant coffee into boiling water unless you have some freshly brewed coffee on hand. The next step is to mix together some brown and white sugars, along with  unsweetened cocoa powder (regular unsweetened or Dutch-processed). Finally, we make the cake batter which is done by whisking the dry ingredients in one bowl, the wet ingredients in another. The two are mixed together, along with some walnuts, and the batter is made. Once the cake batter is spread onto the bottom of a square cake pan, the sugar mixture is sprinkled over top and the hot coffee is poured over top of that. (Some recipes call for adding the sugar/cocoa mixture directly into the hot water. However, when you sprinkle the sugar/cocoa mixture directly on the cake batter, it gives the cake a crisp outer crust, which I prefer.) This strange looking mixture is then placed in a moderate oven and while it bakes it is transformed. Miraculously the cake batter rises to the top of the pan and becomes all puffed and cracked with the sugar/cocoa mixture forming a crisp crust. Conversely, the hot coffee thickens and sinks to the bottom of the pan becoming a pudding sauce. The Chocolate Pudding Cake is done when the cake starts to pull away from the sides of the pan. This dessert is best when served shortly after it is removed from the oven, preferably with a scoop of vanilla or coffee flavored ice cream. If there are any leftovers, they can be covered and stored in the refrigerator and simply reheated in the microwave the next day.