Dark Chocolate Fondant Cake

My all-time dark chocolate fondant cake, that I have been baking for over 15 years. This recipe takes less than 5 minutes to prepare, 17 minutes to bake and is by far the very best fondant you can possibly find. Expect a rich and buttery fudgy texture, an intense dark chocolate flavor, and a decadent melt-in-your-mouth kind of bite. A success every single time!

Raise your hand if you are a dark chocolate lover! I’ve been keeping the recipe for myself for so many years, I can’t believe I never got to share it with you. It’s my go-to recipe every time I have guests showing up at the very last minute or when I’m supposed to bring dessert to a party and I have no time to make it after a long day of work. It’s also, let’s admit it, my favorite recipe to make whenever I have a dark chocolate craving. My friends have been requesting the recipe more and more lately, and I started to feel almost ashamed that after roughly 500 recipes on the blog, my very favorite one was not one of them. Now it’s done! Bake it now, you’ll thank me later (chocolate comes first, always).

Dark chocolate fondant cake is a classic in France. Everyone makes it his own way, so there are many tiny variants to the recipe. The recipe I’m sharing today is the one my college boyfriend’s mom used to make for us over 17 years ago (damn, I’m old!). I wrote the recipe on a piece of paper at that time, learned it by heart, and the rest is history.

Ingredients in a dark chocolate fondant cake

It’s truly ridiculously simple to make this chocolate fondant cake, with basic ingredients everyone has at home. Make sure however you have high quality chocolate for best results. 5 ingredients total is all you need:

• Dark chocolate, at 70% cocoa – Valrhona is my best choice, or Nestlé 70% baking dark chocolate
• Butter with sea salt – it works with unsalted butter too, bu the addition of sea salt enhances the dark chocolate notes.
• Sugar
• Eggs
• All-purpose flour – almost none.

The key to a perfect chocolate fondant cake

Once you have all your ingredients, grab a saucepan, a spatula and nothing more. Because everything happens in one single saucepan.

When all the ingredients are combined, transfer to a springform pan and bake for about 15-17 minutes, keeping an eye on the oven very closely. Every oven is different so you will need to find the sweet spot when your cake is done. Look for baked edges all around while center is still slightly jiggling. Remove from the oven and let the cake cook completely to allow the texture to set.

The chocolate fondant cake should have an uniform fondant-slightly fudgy texture. If the center is still raw and running when you serve it, then you didn’t let the cake long enough in the oven. There is nothing to worry anyway, because the cake will be equally delicious either way. With a little bit of practice, you will learn how to get the perfect texture every single time.

Chocolate fondant versus chocolate fondant cake

Let’s talk about terminology for a second. The recipe that we are talking about today is a chocolate fondant cake, not a chocolate fondant. Here’s the deal: in France, a chocolate fondant means this type of cake you have in front of you. In the US however, and possibly on other parts of the English-speaking world, a chocolate fondant is this tiny individual chocolate lava cake with a decadent runny center (in France we call it “coulant au chocolat”). All that to say that the mention of fondant-cake has an importance here regarding what kind of texture to expect.

More chocolate cake recipes to discover:

• Molten Chocolate Lava Cake
• Healthy Extra Moist Chocolate Cake (flourless, no butter, no added sugar)
• Decadent Chocolate Chestnut Fondant Cake
• French Chocolate Cake
• Spiced Chocolate Cake with Chai Buttercream
• Chocolate Fondant Cake with a Twist of Orange
• Swedish Chocolate Cake “Kladdkaka”

Dark Chocolate Fondant Cake

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• Author: Delphine Fortin
• Prep Time: 5 mins
• Cook Time: 17 mins
• Total Time: 22 minutes
• Yield: 8-10 servings 1x
• Category: Cakes and pies
• Cuisine: French

My all-time dark chocolate fondant cake, that I have been baking for over 15 years. This recipe takes less than 5 minutes to prepare, 17 minutes to bake and is by far the very best fondant you can possibly find. A success every single time!

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Ingredients

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• 7 oz (200g) bitter sweet dark chocolate, at 70% cocoa
• 1/2 cup (125g) butter with sea salt
• 2/3 cup (130g) sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 3 Tablespoons (25g) all-purpose flour

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Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C) and grease a 9-inch (23 cm) springform pan with butter.
2. In a medium saucepan over very low heat, melt butter and dark chocolate, stirring constantly to prevent chocolate from burning. Turn the heat off and stir in sugar. Add the eggs, one at a time and whisking vigorously after each one, to prevent the eggs from cooking. Then gently fold in the flour and stir until smooth.
3. Pour the batter into the springform pan and bake for 15-17 minutes. The sides of the fondant cake should be almost done while center is slightly jiggling. Remove from the oven and let cool completely before serving.

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Did you make this recipe?

Lastly, if you make this Dark Chocolate Fondant Cake, be sure to leave a comment and give this recipe a rating, letting me know how you liked it. And of course, don’t forget to tag me on Instagram! Thank you and enjoy!