Gluten Free German Chocolate Cake

You’re probably familiar with this traditional chocolate confection known as German Chocolate Cake, but you probably also thought its roots date back to Germanic origins (for fairly obvious reasons).

Far from the case, as this unique style of cake was actually first credited to a Texas homemaker who used Sam German’s sweet baking chocolate — made for the Baker’s Chocolate Company — to create this classic light chocolate cake with coconut-pecan frosting.

 

For our gluten free German Chocolate Cake, we use this same unique chocolate, fortunately still available today, still made by the Baker’s Chocolate Company, and even still known as German’s Sweet Chocolate. However, it’s still pretty yummy when made with other chocolates you may be even more familiar with, like semi-sweet (Baker’s even makes that too).

I always like to try out my gluten free recipes on non-gluten-free friends, so I know if they really are great and share-worthy. Let’s just say that in this case, many friends tried to argue that they hailed from German roots and therefore should be entitled to a second, larger slice. 

They were deeply saddened to learn that this argument was all for naught, since the German origin story was a myth. 

Nevertheless, I was left with only one piece of cake to photograph. As you can see, this was a popular recipe.

Making the Gluten Free German Chocolate Cake

To make my gluten free German Chocolate Cake, I like to add brewed coffee, as coffee enhances chocolate flavor, but feel free to use water instead. You won’t taste the coffee if you do decide to use it, that I promise. If you’ve ever made my Best Gluten Free Brownies recipe, you know what I’m talking about!

As for cocoa, use natural baking cocoa powder here, but if you only have “Dutched,” you’ll be ok because there is buttermilk and both baking powder and baking soda in this recipe.

Speaking of buttermilk, I also make this recipe – ok, all my recipes, actually – dairy free, so I have you make your own “buttermilk” by adding lemon juice to your milk/mylk of choice. If you happen to have actual buttermilk on hand and you can tolerate dairy in your diet, simply combine the milk and lemon juice ingredient into one and add only 1 cup of buttermilk instead.

You’ll notice that I don’t offer egg substitutes in this recipe. That’s a bit unusual for me. The reason is because the frosting is an egg yolk-based frosting. I told you it’s unique. At any rate, I’m sure it can be done, but I haven’t worked it out yet. Consult my egg substitutes article and give it a go if you’re dying to try this recipe but need to forego the eggs. I have made recommendations for the cake itself, and my article discusses recommendations for substituting egg yolks, so I’ve given you a head start.

One other note on the frosting: if you are using one of the new coconut evaporated milks (like I did), you will likely find that you need to add one tablespoon of my gfJules Flour to the frosting while it’s cooking to thicken it.

I’ve had several readers reach out to me to lament that canned coconut sweetened condensed and evaporated milks don’t behave in quite the same way as dairy milk when baking, but I found that this simple fix made the frosting behave just like it’s supposed to! Adding one tablespoon of my flour added just enough thickening to cause it to set up like it should and not to run off the top of the cake like it shouldn’t.

And speaking of my gfJules Flour, I invariably get questions about using other flours in my recipes instead. Here’s the thing: All. Gluten-Free. Flour. Blends. Are. Different. And whatever you do, don’t go using a single ingredient flour like almond or coconut in place of a gluten free blend.

There is a so much science behind gluten free flour blends it is quite maddening to work out the details, but trust me when I say that my gfJules Flour works in this recipe as pictured and this recipe was developed for it. The cake is soft and light and not gritty and no gluten eating person would ever know they were enjoying a slice of gluten-free cake. Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to work?

When I first created my blend well over 15 years ago now, I thought all the science was behind me and I had created the magic key to unlock great gluten free baking in all recipes going forward, but since then, I have actually kept improving and modifying the blend so it performs even better!

The results speak for themselves and the fact that it has been voted #1 Gluten Free All Purpose Flour for 4 times in the Gluten Free Awards is a testament to the fact that many, many people agree!

While this gluten free German Chocolate Cake does require a few more steps than your average chocolate cake, it’s so worth it!

I hope your friends and family save a slice for you!

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