These vegan chocolate lava cakes are decadent and rich and will wow any dinner party you are hosting! Gluten free and oil free batter.
If you have never had a molten lava cake, then you are in for a real treat (pun intended). Everyone should be able to enjoy these and thus, we’ve created delicious vegan chocolate lava cakes.
If you don’t even know what I am talking about, let me break it down for you really quickly.
Think about the most rich and decadent chocolate cake that you have ever had. How it just melted into your mouth and left you salivating over each and every single bite.
So good in fact that you wanted to lick the plate and almost did until you snapped back into reality and realized that you are sitting in the middle of a restaurant with 20 of your colleagues.
Okay, now take that delicious cake and add a creamy and luxurious chocolate sauce pouring out of it once you cut into it.
Oh, and did I mention that it’s usually topping with powdered sugar and ice cream?
Yea, it’s that good.
Okay, so now that we are all up to speed and on the same page, you know that this is a cake, and that traditionally that means it’s made with eggs, dairy, and oil.
Guess, what? We are removing all of that and I guarantee you won’t notice a difference!
I mean, have we steered you wrong yet?
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What ingredients do I need to make a vegan chocolate lava cake?
You really don’t need that many ingredients to make this delicious vegan cake. What you do need is:
- 4oz 70% Dark Chocolate
- coconut cream (room temp)
- maple syrup
- gluten free flour (can use regular flour)
- cocoa powder
- baking soda
- baking powder
- powdered sugar
- dairy free milk
- apple cider vinegar
- unsweetened applesauce
- vanilla
- Optional: Vegan Ice Cream
Full amounts listed on the recipe card printable below.
How do you make vegan chocolate lava cakes?
The first step in making vegan chocolate lava cakes is to make the molten (the soft chocolate inside).
In a bowl over a double boiler, melt the chocolate. Once melted and smooth, slowly pour in the coconut cream while constantly stirring. Once combined, add in the maple syrup.
Remove from heat and then, put in freezer. Freeze until hardened, about an hour.
While waiting to freeze, make the cake batter.
Start by combining the dairy free milk and apple cider vinegar together and letting sit for 10 minutes. This makes a vegan buttermilk.
Combine all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and whisk together. Then, add all the wet ingredients and combine with a spatula.
Place in fridge until molten is ready.
Once ready, heat oven to 350 degrees F. Liberally grease your ramekins or use silicone ramekins if oil free.
Place a thick layer of cake batter in the bottom of your ramekin. Then a scoop of the molten in the middle. Next, fill the ramekin with cake batter to 3/4 way full.
Place on a baking sheet and cook for 20-25 minutes.
When done remove and use a plate to invert. Very carefully pull off the ramekins. Top cake with powdered sugar and ice cream if desired.
See video below and tips below to make this perfectly.
Tips for make the perfect vegan molten lava cakes:
We highly encourage you to watch the video below (in the recipe card) in order to see how we are doing this.
- When making the molten, the coconut cream needs to be room temperature or even slightly warmed. If not, when adding to the chocolate, it will seize up. If this happens, put it back on the double boiler and the chocolate will melt back down
- You want to liberally grease your ramekins or the cake will stick to it.
- If you are oil free, then use silicone ramekins with flour sprinkled around.
- If you do not do one of the two above, the cake will get stuck to the bottom and risk it cracking when it comes out.
- We are using 4 Inch ramekins for our photos. If you use smaller ramekins, lower the cooking time. You are looking for the top to be completely done.
- A toothpick inserted will not work with this cake because of the liquid center.
- You want the molten to be frozen and not liquid so it doesn’t pour out when cooking.
- Do not overcook the lava cakes or it will start to crack and bubble out the sides (if it bubbles out the sides, then there will be little to nothing left to pour out when cutting
Can you double this vegan chocolate lava cake recipe?
Yes! Just use the same amounts and double it as written.
Can these vegan chocolate lava cakes be prepped ahead?
Unfortunately, this isn’t one of those recipes to prep ahead.
If you do cook them all the way through, the molten chocolate inside will soak into the cake once cooled, especially if you put into the fridge.
Therefore, it wouldn’t have the same effect with the lava pouring out.
Can I make these vegan molten cakes Top 8 Allergen free?
This recipe has been tested and can be used with gluten free flour. We tested with King Arthur Measure for Measure, specifically.
As far as other allergens, there is coconut cream used to make the molten.
If you are allergic to coconut, we would recommend a thick cashew cream or blended silken tofu. We realize that these are all other top allergens, so you will need to pick one that works for your specific scenario.
*Make sure you are using a soy free chocolate (we like Enjoy Life).
What are other vegan cake ideas I should try?
Whether this seems a little daunting or you made this and just want more ideas, we have them for you!
First, If you love upside down cakes, you have to try our delicious Vegan Pineapple Upside Down Cake
These are some other dairy free cake recipes that you should try:
- Vegan Coconut Cake
- Vegan Strawberry Cake
- The Best Vegan Chocolate Cake
- Vegan Carrot Cake
- Vegan Lemon Pound Cake
- Try these vegan vanilla cupcakes in a cake pan
- Upside Down Cakes: Vegan Pineapple Upside Down Cake and Vegan Apple Upside Down Cake
- Fall favorite: Vegan Pumpkin Cake
Pin these vegan chocolate lava cakes for later:
Vegan Chocolate Lava Cakes
Equipment
- 3 4in ramekins
Ingredients
For the molten (inside filling)
- 4 oz 70% dark chocolate (can be bar of chips)
- 1/2 cup coconut cream, room temperature or slightly warm
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
For the Cake Batter
- 1 cup flour (all purpose or this gluten free flour works)
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 2 tbsp cocoa powder
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 cup dairy free milk
- 1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
- 1 tsp vanilla
Instructions
For the molten (inside filling)
- In a bowl over a double boiler, melt the chocolate.
- Once melted and smooth, slowly pour in the coconut cream while constantly stirring.
- Add in the maple syrup. Combine again.
- Remove from heat and put in freezer. Freeze until hardened, about an hour.
For the Cake Batter
- Make batter, while molten freezes.
- Combine dairy free milk and apple cider vinegar together and let sit for 10 minutes. This makes a vegan buttermilk.
- Combine all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and whisk together.
- Add all the wet ingredients and combine with a spatula.
- Place in fridge until molten is ready.
- Once ready, heat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Liberally grease your ramekins or use silicone ramekins if oil free.
- Place a thick layer of cake batter in the bottom of ramekin.
- Place a scoop of the molten in the middle.
- Fill the ramekin with cake batter to 3/4 way full.
- Place on a baking sheet and cook for 20-25 minutes.
- When done remove and use a plate to invert. Very carefully pull off the ramekins. Top cake with powdered sugar and ice cream if desired
Video
Notes
Nutrition
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Looks so damn good! Gonna try it! Have you tried making vanilla based vegan lava cakes? Would love to know and try some!
Thanks so much. We haven’t but we can try
I’ve been making non-vegan lava cakes recently, and decided to try to make a vegan version for my boyfriend. Had trouble with the cakes sticking and would have been happy with a stronger chocolate flavor in the batter, but would still definitely make again! The molten center was absolutely incredible, and much better than the non-vegan version I had been making. Thank you for a great recipe!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. We will take that flavor into consideration.
When you refer to coconut cream, you mean the stuff in a can, right? And are you mixing it and then measuring, or using only the solid part that separates out? Thank you!!
Only the solid part at the top of the can!
Thanks so much for the quick reply! Can’t wait to try these tonight!!!
We hope you love them
Thanks for this recipe! Can we make this in an 8″ pan as a large cake? How would we multiply the ingredients for it? Thank you!
Hi Julie, we haven’t tried it, but also don’t think we’d recommend this. The cake themselves are very sensitive as small as they are that we don’t imagine this would work well.
Have you ever tried doing this with nonpowdered sugar? I only have raw cane sugar on hand for the batter. I could grind it down but it won’t get as fine as powdered sugar.
We tried a lot of different ways for this and we don’t have any other substitutions. These were very tricky to create the perfect recipe
Would it be possible to use almond flour for this recipe?
We haven’t tested it with anything other than a 1:1 sub so we aren’t sure
Question about the coconut cream – I managed to actually find cans of real coconut cream (as opposed to coconut milk or cream of coconut). Can I use that instead of the “solid” part of the coconut milk? I love all of your recipes so I can’t wait to try this one!