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You made it to Friday! You deserve a treat. If you’re like me, you may prefer for that treat to be some form of baked good. But you have none in the house, and you really don’t want to have to leave the house again or spend an hour or so baking a whole cake, pan of brownies, or batch of cookies. That’s where mug cakes come in. In about 5 minutes, you can have a delicious baked dessert fresh out of your microwave. Some of those microwavable (or is it microwaveable?) desserts suck, though, so I took one for the team and tried out mug cake recipes I found on Pinterest to determine which ones really made my mouth happy. As a side note, we substituted all purpose flour with white whole wheat flour. I don’t believe it influenced the taste or texture to any notable degree, but it made them all a little bit healthier!
So in no particular order…
Nutella Mug Cake
We were out of milk, so I had to venture into dairy-free territory one night. Okay, so the “no particular order” thing might have been an overstatement…I think this was my favorite of the bunch. I mean, how can you go wrong with Nutella? You can’t. But there’s another mug cake that also called for Nutella, and this one was superior. It was nice and gooey, and the flavors were not overpowering. This was a very satisfying evening snack.
The Moistest Chocolate Mug Cake
My apologies to everyone who hates the M word, but it’s a very accurate description. This is the other mug cake that used Nutella, and it happened to be the first one I tried. It was quite good, but it was almost too rich to enjoy properly. Maybe if I’d had a tall glass of icy cold milk to go with it, that could have helped. It was difficult to finish the whole mug because the chocolate flavor was just so powerful. If it wouldn’t defeat the purpose of a mug cake, I’d enjoy this better in a dish with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
60-Second Chocolate Chip Mug Cookie
As long as you don’t go into this thinking it’s going to be exactly like a chocolate chip cookie, you’ll the fine. It does taste just like its cookie namesake, but the texture is that of cake. If you have the time, ingredients, and inclination, a batch of chocolate chip cookies will give you that cookie experience that you want – but you’re reading a post about microwave mug cakes for the instant gratification factor. This will totally satisfy you sweet tooth and your chocolate chip cookie hankering. The warm and melty chocolate chips inside that cookie batter taste…Mmm.
Peanut Butter Swirl Brownie in a Mug
This was Tom’s favorite. I let him have a bite of mine, and he went and made himself one, too. We are big peanut butter fans in this house. The only “complaint” I could make is that there wasn’t enough peanut butter flavor to balance out the chocolate. Next time, I’d probably use a slightly larger scoop of peanut butter. If you’re allergic to peanuts but not tree nuts, I bet this would be amazing with cashew butter or almond butter, too.
Snickerdoodle Mug Cake
Last, but certainly not least, the only non-chocolate contender. If it’s not chocolate or peanut butter, it’s gotta be cinnamon. At least for my sweet tooth! WARNING: DO NOT USE A STANDARD SIZED COFFEE MUG! Tom served me this snickerdoodle mug cake in an overflowing mug on a plate, because it went all volcanic on us. As such, it did not cook very evenly, so some of it was still quite doughy, while others were not-quite-crispy. Thankfully, it was all delicious. Because of the way it’s made with layers, there’s cinnamon everywhere! While I highly recommend using an oversized mug, I must confess that my favorite part was eating the stuff that baked on to the lip of the mug.
Go forth and eat mug cake, my friends! Let me know which one(s) you try in the comments.
P.S. This blog post concept came AFTER I’d tried three of the mug cakes, and I figured I should try at least two more FOR SCIENCE.
That’s me: Christina Gleason. I’m a writer, editor, and disability advocate. I'm a multiply disabled autistic lady doing my best in this world built for abled people. I’m a geek for grammar, fantasy, and casual gaming. I hate vegetables. I cannot reliably speak, so I’ll happily conduct business over email or messaging instead.
