“Minute” Chocolate Mug Cake – Can You Really Make Cake in 60 seconds?

No, it actually takes 45 seconds! Turns out I was wrong about mug cakes. I’ve had the belief over the past few decades, that a decent mini chocolate cake from a microwave was impossible. I based this on the fact that every example I’d come across had the texture of a hockey puck.

I assumed the cause was the microwave’s ultra-violent thermodynamics, and that there was nothing anyone could do about it, but then I got to thinking. Maybe there was a way to tweak the existing recipes out there to minimize this problem. Long story short, I tweaked an existing recipe, which minimized the problem.

The secrets were using smaller amounts of batter, and cooking for way less time than has been suggested by others. Once you’ve boiled off all the water in the batter, you are totally screwed, so the idea here is to just barely get to the point of doneness, and stop. For me that was exactly 45 seconds.