Give Chocolate Cake A Satisfying Crunch With An Ingredient From The Breakfast Aisle

There are many adjectives to describe chocolate cake; decadent, luscious, and rich are three that come to mind. But crunchy isn't a descriptor of chocolate cake's soft, springy crumb and thick, creamy frosting. However, adding crunch to cake brings even more depth and the perfect contrast to an otherwise soft textural profile. And you can give chocolate cake a satisfying crunch with an ingredient from the breakfast aisle. Cocoa Pebbles is the breakfast cereal that'll enhance both the texture and chocolatey flavor of your next chocolate cake recipe.

Cocoa Pebbles doesn't contain real cocoa, but instead alkalized cocoa known as dutched cocoa. This process takes out the bitterness of real cocoa powder and enhances the sweet, chocolatey flavor, which is why we love it so much in cereal. As an addition to cake, it'll also enhance the chocolate flavor and provide a crunchy contrast. And there are many ways you can incorporate Cocoa Pebbles into your next chocolate cake recipe. The easiest way is to use the Cocoa Pebbles as an exterior coating by simply pressing them into the sides of your freshly frosted cake.

You can also incorporate Cocoa Pebbles into the cake crumb itself by creating a cereal swirl to break up the cake batter. Combine Cocoa Pebbles with a bit of flour, sugar, oil, and chocolate chips to layer on top of a portion of the cake batter, then top it with the rest of the cake batter and bake.

Cocoa Pebbles makes a great crunchy coating to press into cake frosting and instills a crunchy bite to break up the spongy cake crumb. But you can also use Cocoa Pebbles to bring a crunchy element to ice cream cake. Of course, cereal gets soggy when sitting in milk and soft, liquidy ice cream poses the same problem. So, be sure to create a barrier to lock in the crunch by coating the cereal in melted chocolate and letting the mixture set, similar to a Hershey's crunch bar. Then you can break up the chocolate cereal and press it into softened ice cream in a cake mold.

Of course, there are other chocolate cereals out there, and we found plenty that we like more than Cocoa Pebbles. Cocoa Krispies ranked higher in our taste test of chocolate cereals, for example. But you can swap chocolate cereal for any other kind of cereal that strikes your fancy. And chocolate cake isn't the only cake that will benefit from the crunch of cereal. You can add chocolate cereal swirl to vanilla cake or a strawberry cake mix. If you're making a spice cake like gingerbread or pumpkin spice, you can enhance the spices with a coating of crushed Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Bring a nutty swirl to a chocolate cake recipe with the help of Cap'n Crunch or Reese's cereal. Or, swap Cocoa Pebbles for Fruity Pebbles to press into a vanilla cake with strawberry buttercream frosting.