Go Back Email Link
slice of chocolate cake on white plate next to fork with more cake in background

Decadent & Fudgy Chocolate Cherry Bundt Cake

Print Recipe
Super moist chocolate cake studded with cherries and covered in a rich chocolate espresso glaze...this is what dessert dreams are made of
Course Something Sweet
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 1 hour
Total Time 1 hour 30 minutes

Ingredients

For Cake

  • 2 sticks butter
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa* see notes
  • 3/4 cup water
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 8 oz mascarpone cheese room temperature*(see notes)
  • 1 Tbsp vanilla
  • 2 eggs room temperature
  • 2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp kosher salt
  • 1 can cherry pie filling * see notes to make your own
  • 1-2 Tbsp sugar for coating pan

For Glaze

  • 1/4 cup heavy cream
  • 1/4 cup corn syrup
  • 1/4 cup espresso or strong coffee
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1 cup chocolate chips

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 350
  • For the cake: Melt butter over low heat and stir in cocoa until smooth
  • Whisk in water and remove from heat.
  • To the warm cocoa mixture add sugar, mascarpone, vanilla and eggs. Whisk until smooth.
  • In another bowl combine flour, baking soda and salt. Add dry ingredients all at once to wet ingredients, stirring with a spatula until incorporated. Once incorporated use whisk to mix just until smooth.
  • Stir in cherry pie filling
  • Grease 10" bundt pan with cooking spray and use a pastry brush to make sure all areas are covered. Sprinkle pan with sugar, turning and patting until all surfaces are covered. Do this just before pouring batter into pan.
  • Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth evenly.
  • Bake in center of preheated oven 1 hour, or until firm to the touch and edges are just starting to pull away from the sides of the pan.
  • Cool in pan on wire rack 20 minutes
  • Loosen cake carefully with a knife and invert onto wire rack to cool completely
  • Make the glaze: Place chocolate chips in bowl and set aside.
  • In small saucepan combine cream, corn syrup, and espresso and heat just until boiling. Take off of heat, stir in vanilla and pour over chocolate chips. Stir and let sit 1 minute. Whisk until it comes together in a smooth pourable glaze.
  • With cake still on wire rack place a plate underneath (large enough to catch drips) and spoon glaze over cake letting it drip down sides and onto plate. Once all of the glaze has been used, replace first plate with another plate and start spooning glaze from the first plate back over the cake.
  • Let stand until glaze is set and carefully transfer from rack onto serving plate. Garnish with Luxardo cherries, if desired.

Notes

  • Use regular unsweetened cocoa (like Hershey's), not Dutch process cocoa. They are two different things and react differently in recipes. When a recipe doesn't specify which to use, a good rule of thumb is that if baking SODA is called for use regular unsweetened cocoa and if baking POWDER is called for use dutch process cocoa.
  • You can substitute regular cream cheese for the mascarpone but the mascarpone is best. If using regular cream cheese make sure it's softened and beat it with 1 Tbsp heavy cream to loosen it before adding to batter.
  • You can make your own cherry pie filling by combining 16 oz frozen sweet cherries with 1 Tbsp lemon juice, 1/3 cup sugar, 2 Tbsp cornstarch and 2 Tbsp water in a saucepan and stirring constantly over low heat until liquid bubbles, thickens and is no longer foggy. Remove from heat and stir in 1/4 tsp almond extract. Let cool completely before using in batter.