Chocolate Cake With Cream Cheese Frosting (Without Eggs)

Learn how to make this gorgeous chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting with this easy recipe. The layers of chocolate cake are made without eggs and easily mixed, just like cake mix. And the frosting is a thick cream cheese frosting that calls for less sugar than most recipes, so it's tangy and smooth.

Everybody needs an easy chocolate layer cake recipe that you can stir together in minutes. This chocolate cake is made without eggs, and yields three layers of fluffy cake, perfect for making a chocolate birthday cake.

Jump to:

• What You Need to Make This Chocolate Layer Cake
• Substitutions and Variations
• How to Make It
• Cream Cheese Frosting Alternatives
• Layer Cake Storage
• Serving Suggestions
• 📖 Recipe

What You Need to Make This Chocolate Layer Cake

To tackle this recipe, you will need two sets of ingredients to make the two components: the eggless chocolate cake and the thick cream cheese frosting. While the list of what you need seems long, you actually don't need anything special, and you likely already have all (or most) of the ingredients in your pantry and fridge!

• For the chocolate cake without eggs:
  • milk, non-dairy beverage (like soy milk), or even water will work in this recipe
  • vinegar, either plain white vinegar or cider vinegar, to react with baking soda to help the cake rise as it bakes
  • all-purpose flour to give the cake structure
  • baking soda to help the cake rise. Do not use baking powder here.
  • cocoa powder, preferably a high quality Dutch-processed cocoa powder like Cacao Barry extra brute cocoa powder, which is my favourite
  • salt, preferably Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
  • sugar, specifically brown sugar, either light or dark, or even granulated sugar
  • neutral-tasting oil like canola oil, vegetable oil, or a very light-tasting olive oil. Don't use extra virgin olive oil which has too much flavour for this cake
  • vanilla extract to enhance the flavour
• For the cream cheese frosting:
  • butter, preferably unsalted butter since the cream cheese in the recipe has enough salt
  • icing sugar, also called powdered sugar
  • cream cheese, preferably full-fat Philadelphia brand cream cheese. Make sure to buy the cream cheese in block format that is firmer than the whipped kind.
  • vanilla extract to enhance the flavour

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

Substitutions and Variations

• For the chocolate cake recipe
  • Milk—This eggless chocolate cake recipe is made with milk, so it's vegetarian, not vegan, but you could replace the cow's milk with your favourite non-dairy beverage, like soy milk, almond milk, or oat milk, if you want a vegan chocolate cake.
  • Vinegar—I usually use regular white vinegar but you could also use apple cider vinegar. You need the acidity of the vinegar for the baking soda to react. Do not omit the vinegar or else replace the milk+vinegar with buttermilk (see next bullet point).
  • Buttermilk—You can replace the combination of milk and vinegar with 1 cup (250 mL) of buttermilk. This will allow you to skip the vinegar but still bring that acidity necessary for the leavening agent to react.
  • Sugar—The brown sugar can be replaced with regular granulated sugar or granulated cane sugar. Either will work great! Do not use turbinado or a coarse sugar, which won't dissolve properly and will have a negative impact on taste and texture.
  • Oil—I always bake with canola oil, but you could replace it with a light olive oil or grapeseed oil.
  • Cocoa powder—I bake with a Dutch-processed cocoa powder. This recipe will likely work with natural (non-Dutch-processed) cocoa powder.
• For the frosting—use the best quality cream cheese you can. I prefer Philadelphia brand full-fat cream cheese. If you want to use a different brand of cream cheese, I can't make a suggestion because I've found the texture and taste of Philadelphia brand cream cheese is unmatched. Other brands I have tried had an impact on taste and texture, so I only recommend Philadelphia.

How to Make It

This chocolate cake couldn't be easier to make because it uses the two-bowl mixing method (also called the muffin mixing method). It's the same method as cake mix, actually, where the wet ingredients are added to the bowl with the dry ingredients, and stirred together to combine them.

Step 1—Whisk the wet ingredients together in a large measuring cup, including the sugar (image 1). Sift the dry ingredients in a large bowl (image 2).

Step 2—Pour the wet ingredients over the dry (image 3) and mix the two together to form a smooth chocolate cake batter (image 4). I like to use a Danish dough whisk for this task.

Step 3—Divide the cake batter between three buttered and floured 6-inch cake pans (or dusted with cocoa powder) (image 5). Make sure the cake batter is level in the pans by briefly spinning them on the counter. Band them a couple of times on the counter to release any big bubbles (image 6).

Step 4—Bake the cakes on the middle rack of the oven (image 7), checking them with a cake tester to ensure they are baked through. Set them on a cooling rack to firm up before unmoulding with the help of an offset spatula.

Once the chocolate cake layers have cooled completely, you can prepare the frosting. For the frosting, I use the same technique for thick cream cheese frosting, adding the cream cheese last to the creamed butter and sugar. This way, you use less icing sugar, but can still achieve a thick texture. This frosting is so thick you can use it for decorating and piping.

Step 5—Combine the butter and icing sugar in the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (image 10) and whip them together until light and fluffy (image 10).

Step 6—Add blocks of cold cream cheese to the bowl of butter and sugar (image 12) and continue whipping the mixture until smooth and thick (image 13).

Step 7—Level the cake layers using a large serrated knife once completely cool (image 14). This creates a flat surface for more stable stacking. Pipe a quarter of the frosting onto the top of the first layer of cake set on a cake stand (image 15), then smooth it with a mini offset spatula (image 16)

Step 8—repeat the frosting and stacking for all three layers of cake, then smooth the frosting on the exterior to create a thin crumb coat (image 17). Refrigerate until firm before frosting the sides and top with a final layer of frosting (image 18).

Step 9—I like to decorate this cake with chocolate sprinkles so that it is clear from the outside that the cake is chocolate.

Cream Cheese Frosting Alternatives

If you don't like cream cheese frosting, you can replace it with:

• chocolate fudge frosting (made from butter, icing sugar, melted chocolate, cocoa powder, and sour cream)
• Italian meringue buttercream (made from egg whites, soft ball sugar syrup, and butter)
• American buttercream (made from icing sugar, butter, and vanilla)
• peanut butter frosting (made from peanut butter, butter, and icing sugar)

Layer Cake Storage

Given this chocolate birthday cake is made with cream cheese frosting, it's best to store it in the fridge. If you've cut into the cake, just cover the cut edges with pieces of parchment to prevent them from drying out. Place the cake in the fridge until the frosting is firm and cold, then cover the whole thing with aluminum foil. You can store this cake for up to a week, or freeze slices for later.

For a detailed explanation, read about how to store cake.

Serving Suggestions

Serve this chocolate layer cake with ice cream, either vanilla ice cream, dark chocolate ice cream, or cookie ice cream.

If you tried this recipe for the best chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

📖 Recipe