Low Sugar One-Bowl Chocolate Fudge Cake

Looking for an easy one-bowl chocolate fudge cake that happens to be low in sugar? This indulgent but not-entirely-guilt-inducing cake is perfect for a special treat without the sugar crash, cravings for more and tummy aches that inevitably follow!

Sometimes, even when most of the time you are very happy with the yummy food you eat when you live a low sugar lifestyle, you want something a little more “treat-like”. Something for a celebration, perhaps. Certainly something sweeter and richer and more like the food you used to eat before lowering your sugar intake.

Although I find it frustrating that celebrations nowadays revolve around sweet foods, I do occasionally enjoy celebrating with something sweet myself.

It was my birthday a couple of weeks ago, and I knew exactly what I wanted for it. A chocolate fudge cake. A classic. And one I dearly love.

But I knew exactly what would happen if I bought one. The same thing that has happened with virtually every other sweet treat I have bought in the last six months to a year: I’d get two bites in and declare it “too sweet“, before wishing I’d never bought it in the first place and feel like I’d wasted my money. Not to mention the potential for stomach pains and nausea, even occasional headaches and the inevitable “sugar crash” that I get when I do reach for the sugar. Although I’m all for the occasional treat, and feel no guilt for eating a sugary slice of cake every now and then knowing it isn’t a regular thing, the effects are often unpleasant for me now.

So not what I want for my birthday!

Instead, I decided to look up the easiest one-bowl, 5 min prep, yummiest-looking fudge cake I could find, and simply adapt it to a point where I knew I would actually enjoy it, and have none of the frustrating side effects. I settled on adapting it from this one, although if you wanted to find a cocoa-based rather than chocolate-based one and replace the sugar with about 2/3 of the amount of xylitol, then you could end up with an even lower sugar/sugar free one!

(I tried this cocoa-based idea for a party a week later and it went down well, although I think this recipe was marginally better! But if you wanted that slightly healthier version, I used this cake recipe but halved the amount of everything, and only used 70g of xylitol with 1 tbsp rice syrup in place of the 100g sugar. I then used the ganache recipe below.)

The result was a fudgy, moist, unbelievably-rich-but-not-too-sweet, lower-than-usual-sugar chocolate fudge cake.

This cake does not for a moment pretend to be virtuous. But it contains a heck of a lot less sugar than most chocolate cakes (only about 1-2g per serving – as opposed to the usual 20-40g – in fact!), and still tastes so rich that you only need a small slice to satisfy your craving for something sweet and celebratory.

I think maybe this cake will be appearing at other birthdays in the coming year!

Little hands can:

• carefully help tip in the dry ingredients into the pan and stir (with supervision)
• whisk the ganache
• spread the cake halves with ganache
• help decorate!

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Low Sugar One-Bowl Chocolate Fudge Cake

Prep Time

10 mins

Cook Time

50 mins

Total Time

1 hr

 

A delicious, lower sugar version of a chocolate fudge cake! Yummy, gooey and healthier than the shop-bought kind, this chocolate cake is perfect for low sugar birthdays!

Servings: 6 " cake, serves 10-12

Ingredients

For the cake:

• 4 oz (100g) dark chocolate, at least 85%, roughly chopped
• 1/2-3/4 cup (100-150g)* xylitol (you could use 3/4 cup/150g erythritol, 1/4 cup/50g Natvia (erythritol-stevia blend) if you are not a xylitol fan - or, if you don't mind adding a little sugar back in, I personally love using 1/4 cup/50g of a sugar-stevia blend)
• 1 (110g) stick unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup (110ml) milk
• 1 and 1/2 tbsp neutral oil like macadamia oil, almond oil or olive oil (not extra virgin, it will taste too strong!)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1/4 cup (20g) cacao powder or cocoa powder
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1 cup (140g) plain all-purpose flour (gluten-free is fine, or use half wholemeal flour for a slightly denser but more wholesome and flavoursome cake)
• 1 tbsp almond extract or Amaretto, optional

For the ganache:

• 1 cup (150ml) double (heavy) cream
• 1/2 cup (40g) cocoa powder
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• liquid stevia, rice syrup, xylitol or more vanilla extract, to taste

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 170C/325F/gas 3. Grease and line a 6" (15cm) cake tin.
2. Heat a pan with the chocolate, butter, xylitol and 1/4 cup (55ml) milk over a medium-low heat until everything is melted and combined. Do not boil.
3. Take off the heat and mix in the remaining milk and the oil, then add the rest of the ingredients and mix until smooth and combined.
4. Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin and bake in the preheated oven for 45 mins to 1 hour, checking with a metal skewer to see if it is cooked (if it is, the skewer should have nothing on it when you remove it from the cake, although with a fudgy cake like this, I like there to be just a tiny little bit coming up to make it almost a bit brownie-like).
5. Allow the cake to cool slightly, then remove from its tin and allow to cool completely while you make the ganache.
6. For the ganache: Heat the cream over a low heat until just below simmering point, then take off the heat and whisk in the other ingredients until it thickens. Allow to cool, at which point it should become a spreadable consistency.
7. Cut the cooled cake in half horizontally and sandwich the two halves with the ganache. Cover in your choice of cocoa powder, icing sugar, sprinkles, candles, decorations, chocolate chips, flaked almonds, or whatever takes your fancy.

Recipe Notes

This cake is super-super-rich, so even though it looks small, a little really does go a long way!

*Want a sweet tooth pleaser cake? You may need the bigger amount of sweetener. But next time you make it, try using less, and keep cutting down until you've found a good sweet spot!

Looking for more one-bowl treats? Check out all of these.