Chocolate Almond Cake: Only Five Ingredients & GF

This amazing chocolate almond cake contains only five ingredients, yet it’s one of the best chocolate cakes I’ve ever eaten. It’s made with ground almonds rather than flour, so it’s naturally gluten-free. It’s rich, has a wonderful smooth texture and is utterly delicious.

October 2025 – This post is in the process of being updated to include new images and extra information, including a how to section.

Mother’s Day! Another opportunity to try out a new cake. A friend had posted a comment a few weeks ago giving a recipe for a flourless and what looked to be a rather rich and delicious cake which had come via way of her aunt. I have to say I was rather looking forward to giving this one a go.

Dive Right In

• Why You’ll Want To Make This Chocolate Almond Cake
• Flourless Almond Chocolate Cake
• Ingredients, Additions And Substitutions
• How To Make A Chocolate Almond Cake
• Other Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipes You Might Like
• Keep In Touch
• Pin It
• The Recipe

Why You’ll Want To Make This Chocolate Almond Cake

• Elegant yet easy – ideal for entertaining or an easy weekend bake that feels indulgent enough for a dinner party dessert.
• Keeps well – the almonds and butter keep it tender for days. It has a soft crumb that practically melts in the mouth and the flavour deepens over time.
• Naturally gluten-free – this flourless cake is perfect for anyone avoiding gluten. It compromises on neither taste nor texture.
• Only five ingredients – no fancy shopping list, just simple pantry staples that alchemises into something special.
• Pure comfort – rich, fudgy, and full of chocolatey goodness, it’s everything a cake should be.
• Rich and chocolatey – dark chocolate gives it a deep, satisfying flavour that pairs beautifully with the nutty sweetness of ground almonds.
• Versatile – delicious warm with a scoop of ice cream or simply dusted with cocoa powder or icing sugar once cool.

Flourless Almond Chocolate Cake

When I’d first noted this recipe I assumed it would be dead easy as there were only five ingredients involved. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t look at the method that closely and with only a couple of hours to go before having to leave with the finished cake, I realised that my not-so favourite creaming method was involved again.

Given that this was destined to be a special cake I thought I’d better do it just so. Faced with a lump of rock hard butter, I proceeded to do some serious ‘working out’. My arm ached during and after the whole procedure.

Luckily, it all paid off in the end, because it was a truly delicious cake – rich, chocolatey and smooth textured. Voted by the foreman of the jury, aka CT, as the best so far. In fact, it makes a fabulous adult dessert served with clotted cream.

Chocolate Almond Cake: Top Tip

Make sure you remove your butter from the fridge well in advance of making this chocolate almond cake. It needs to be at room temperature and ideally soft enough to cream with the sugar straight away.

Ingredients, Additions And Substitutions

With only five ingredients needed to make this almond chocolate cake, not including a pinch or two of salt, it’s a really easy recipe to remember.

Almonds

Shop bought ground almonds are both easy to find and to use. However, if you try grinding your own almonds, you’ll really notice the difference, both in terms of flavour and texture.

Time permitting, I often go this route as the quality of the finished product is so much better. You can use skin-on or skin-off almonds, the difference isn’t that noticeable. It’s best to stick with finely ground almonds though, if you want a smooth bake.

Butter

As with most cakes, unsalted butter is the best for baking. It’s richer and creamier than salted and you can add as much or as little salt to your bake as you like.

Chocolate

Dark chocolate is a must for this bake. It’s meant to be rich and not too sweet. This means it’s best suited for adult consumption; kids might find it a bit bitter and probably too rich.

Generally chocolate found in your supermarket’s baking aisle is better suited to melting, so use a good quality cooking bar if you can. Go with chocolate that has a cacao content of between seventy and eighty five percent if possible.

Eggs

There’s no need for baking powder in this bake; the eggs do all the heavy lifting. As always, use free-range eggs and preferably organic ones if you can. Organic certified eggs have the highest welfare standards and must always have access to some decent outdoor space.

Sugar

Brown sugar gives welcome caramel notes to the cake and pairs really well with chocolate. I’ve used light brown muscovado sugar, but it’s fine to use something like rapadura instead. Generally, the less processed the sugar, the better.

Having said that dark brown or molasses sugar might be a bit too much and you could end up with a cake that’s more bitter than sweet.

How To Make A Chocolate Almond Cake

The preparation of this cake is a little more involved than you’d expect from a bake with only five ingredients. So put aside a bit of time as you’ll need to melt chocolate as well as whisk egg whites.

Please refer to the recipe card at the bottom of this post for cooking temperatures and quantities of ingredients used.

Step 1. Soften Butter

Remove your butter from the fridge well in advance of making this chocolate almond cake. It needs to be at room temperature and ideally soft enough to cream with the sugar straight away.

Cold butter is really hard to work with. How long it takes to soften will depend on how warm your kitchen is.

As soon as you take the butter out of the fridge, cut it into small cubes and place in a large mixing bowl. It will soften faster and you’ll find it easier to cream.

Top Tip

If you forget to take your butter out of the fridge in time or, like me, you have a cold kitchen, there is a remedy. Place the butter in your mixing bowl, then put the bowl in the oven.

Turn the oven on to its lowest setting and leave the butter for ten minutes or so. Be careful though, you want the butter to soften, not melt.

Step 2. Melt Chocolate

Break the chocolate into small pieces and place in a heatproof bowl that can sit snugly over a saucepan. Pour two to three centimetres (about one inch) of water into the pan. Just make sure the bowl won’t be in danger of touching it.

Place the pan over the bowl and bring the water slowly to a gentle simmer. Turn the heat off and leave the chocolate in the bowl for a few minutes to melt. As soon as it looks melted or nearly so, give it a stir to smooth out any lumps.

Remove the bowl from the pan so that the chocolate can cool a little.

Step 3. Cream Butter and Sugar

Whilst the chocolate is melting, cream the butter and sugar together. You can do this, as I do in a bowl with a wooden spoon, or use an electric mixer.

Beat well for two to three minutes until the mixture is pale in colour and fluffy in texture.

Step 4. Add Eggs, Chocolate and Almonds

Separate the egg whites from the egg yolks and place in a clean bowl. Add the yolks to the creamed butter mix and beat them in until fully incorporated.

Beat in the cooled melted chocolate. It doesn’t matter if the chocolate is slightly warm, but make sure it’s not so hot it will melt the butter.

Then stir in the almonds.

Step 5. Whisk Egg Whites

With a clean whisk, beat the egg whites along with the salt until stiff. Although you can do this by hand, it takes a while and is a lot easer with electric beaters or a stand mixer.

Fold the egg whites into the chocolate mix as carefully as you can. Inevitably, you’ll lose some air, but try to keep it to a minimum.

Step 6. Bake

Line the bottom of your baking tin with parchment paper or silicone liner and lightly grease the sides. Alternatively use a silicone mould and lightly grease it.

Scrape the cake mix into the tin and level it out.

Bake until the cake is well risen and firm to the touch. Don’t worry if it cracks on top, that’s entirely normal. Although it rises high as it cooks, it will flatten once you take it out of the oven.

Remove from the oven and leave it to cool in the tin for ten minutes. Then turn the cake out onto a wire rack to cool completely, unless you’re going to serve it warm as a dessert.

Once cool, dust with cocoa powder or icing sugar if you prefer. A few chocolate flakes don’t go amiss either. Enjoy as it is or serve with whipped cream, clotted cream or crème fraîche. And maybe a few raspberries?

Other Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipes You Might Like

I have two very similar recipes for chocolate almond cakes, but they’re also somewhat different. All three recipes, I hasten to add though, are delicious.

The first is my version of Claudia Roden’s gâteau au chocolat. It too is made with the same five ingredients, but the quantities are quite different and the method varies somewhat too.

You can find the recipe in this post for Willies cloud forest chocolate cake. Willie’s cake is made with six ingredients, but that’s because there are two types of sugar rather than just one. Again the quantities vary as does the method.

And here are a few other flourless chocolate cakes that are quite different to the chocolate almond ones:

• Black Forest gâteau
• Chestnut chocolate log
• Chilli chestnut chocolate cake
• Coffee cardamom chocolate mousse cake
• Nigella’s chocolate pistachio cake
• Chocolate polenta cake

Keep in Touch

Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you make this sumptuous chocolate almond cake, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. And do please rate the recipe. Have you any top tips? Do share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.

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If you’d like more gluten-free recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious and nutritious, of course.

Choclette x

Chocolate Almond Cake. PIN IT.