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Recipe updated 3/28/16
If Briana makes a fudgy chocolate layer cake, she’ll want some frosting to go with it.
If the cake wasn’t fudgy enough, this frosting will be. It’s like fudge on fudge. One fudge is deeply moist and chocolate, and the other is creamy-melt-in-your-mouth with a twinge of mocha.
Feel free to use this frosting on things other than my chocolate layer cake. I won’t tell if you make a batch and just straight up eat it with a spoon.
If all that butter and cream cheese scares you, I’m going to work on a lower-fat option before too long. But who’s scared of fats? Fats make you SKINNY! That being said, a chocolate pudding frosting sounds almost as good as a mocha fudge frosting.
(Update: click here for a lightened-up, smaller batch version of this frosting.)
This frosting is very firm and fudgelike once refrigerated, so frost whatever you need to frost before chilling this stuff because once it’s chilled it’ll be impossible to spread. I love it straight out of the fridge in its firm, fudge-like state, but if you want a softer frosting, just let it set out for 20-30 minutes before devouring.
With its silky smooth texture and creamy rich feel in your mouth, this Fudgy Mocha Frosting is truly fit for a special occasion.
Check out this beautiful cake that Katie Casinger made and covered with this frosting! I believe she used the Special Occasion Cake recipe from the original Trim Healthy Mama book:
You can pin this recipe from my desserts board here.
You can find this recipe in my cookbook, Necessary Food.
- 2 sticks of salted butter, softened
- 8 oz. reduced fat cream cheese, softened
- ½ cup cocoa powder
- 2 T THM Super Sweet Blend, or more to taste
- 1 T instant decaf coffee (gluten-intolerant people may need to omit this if a gluten free brand cannot be found)
- 2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- With a hand mixer, beat all ingredients except the whipping cream together until smooth.
- Add the cream and beat on high till the mixture is lighter in color, fluffy, and thick.
- Frost whatever you are going to be frosting before refrigeration because the frosting hardens to an almost fudge-like consistency in the refrigerator.
- Yields approximately 4 cups of frosting. This is plenty for a three layer cake. A half batch of this frosting ices 18 cupcakes or more with ease.
- Hershey Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
- Truvia
- THM Super Sweet Blend can be purchased from the Trim Healthy Mama online store.
maybe the collagen would give the bulk?? or unsweetened/unflavored protein powder??
Do you know how many carbs are in this? I just started Keto & I am searching for desserts.
No, I’m afraid I don’t, but I think MyFitnessPal has a good calculator.
I found using salted butter made this inedible. Luckily I only made a half batch. Will try again using unsalted.
Do you whip the heavy whipping cream first? I think I would.
Nope. 🙂 Just beat the other ingredients, then add the cream and beat until the frosting is thick and fluffy. It whips just fine with the other ingredients.
Hi
I noticed the coconut oil isn’t in the ingredient list anymore. Is there a reason for this? I’ve made this frosting before and loved it, today I’m going to try it with PB powder on my Trimtastic Peanut Yellow Zucchini Cake 😉
Now I see it 🙂 You’ve replaced it with more cream. I can see why, but had to share my experience.
I used the recipe with the coconut oil (had a printout in my THM Cookbook) and as said, replaced the cacao for PB powder and added like 1/3 cup homemade PB for fun. It was AMAZING! Even the sugaraholics loved it!
Sooooooo good! And now I realise I forgot to take pictures 🙁
Oh well, it’s time for breakfast, wanna guess what I’m eating? Yes, leftovers 😀
That sounds like an awesome tweak! Thanks for sharing!
Hi Dina! I’ve made some tweaks to the recipe so it doesn’t set up quite so hard in the refrigerator (it will still get nice and fudgy though). 🙂 If you like, you can substitute coconut oil for part of the butter.
Ack, not my day in the kitchen. I made this for the first time and it ended up lumpy! And tart, I thought, so I added more sweetener. We will see tomorrow if this iced cake gets devoured at the picnic. (My picnic eggs never got smooth either, so we will have lumpy eggs too! And I was making the broccoli cauliflower salad and — duh — cooked the veggies! Like I said, not my day in the kitchen!)
Oh dear! I’ve had those days too…
Hi Brianna! I’m going to be making this for Easter Sunday on a chocolate zucchini cake,and I don’t have the instant coffee. My question is, would regular coffee work?
BTW I love your blog! You are my favorite blogger! As I am 13 and trying to loose weight on THM I have found your blog so encouraging! Thank you for all the great recipes you have created!
Also wondering if you have ever thought of experimenting with a 3 musketeers kind of thing?
Well, let’s just say that I have a couple hundred recipe ideas written down in a spreadsheet, so it might be in there somewhere…haha. I think YOU should try! That would be awesome!
I doubt regular coffee grinds would dissolve like instant coffee, so I probably wouldn’t try that.
Thanks for the sweet comment!
Okay! I will have to add instant coffee to the shopping list! I will play around with the 3 musketeers and let you know how it goes!
Thank you Brianna!
I LOVE chocolate and have been looking for a frosting like this, so thank you!!
Just wondering: I want to make a THM icing good for piping for my daughter’s first birthday. I think this looks like it will work, BUT I want to make hers another color. If I remove the cocoa powder, what would you recommend doing to achieve the same texture? I’ll also need to add some food coloring; I have liquid, gel, and powder.
Hi Leslie! Removing the cocoa powder and substituting it with something else is likely to be a little tricky (I don’t know of anything that you could substitute 1:1 that would have the same texture and a good flavor). You’re welcome to try experimenting with this recipe and use a combination of oat fiber, powdered sweetener, and maybe even some sour cream to replace the cocoa powder. I do have a white buttercream frosting recipe that I haven’t posted yet that uses a variety of different things to replace the bulk lost by cocoa powder; I’ll have to get that up sometime soon.
Thanks, Briana! I just tried this frosting and it IS incredible. I will certainly be making this one again and again!
what is a “doonk”?
Hi Michele! A doonk is 1/32 tsp. (most pure stevia extract powders come with a tiny scoop that size for measuring).
Can I use on top of special agent brownie? Wud that be too many carbs?
There are no significant carb sources in this frosting recipe, so that should be fine. 🙂
OK thanks. I am thinking I should be more worried about the amount of fat than carb 🙂
Yes, it’s definitely not something you’d want to go super-overboard on. 😉
Can I use some thing other than coconut oil, because of an allergy.
I’m sure more butter would work.
Is the instant coffee necessary? I have everything but that and want to make this for brownies I have in the oven right now 🙂 Thanks!
It’s for the “mocha” flavor and obviously adds to the taste as a whole, but I don’t think the frosting would be terrible without it. Your choice.
Thank you! I’ve been looking for a frosting and this is just what I was looking for. Can’t wait to try it!
Hi! I like in the UK and our butter doesn’t come in ‘sticks’! Can you advise the weight alternative that you are using? Thanks so much!
A stick of butter is equivalent to 113.4 g or 4 oz. 🙂
Could you use the Louanne coconut oil as it doesn’t harden, maybe the growing would stay softer? Not sure I’m new to using it myself.
To my understanding, any coconut oil hardens when it is cold. I’ve used Louann coconut oil before (actually up until about two months ago I used it exclusively) and mine was always in a firm state unless I heated it.
How much frosting does this make? How many total cups (& how many cupcakes, how much cake, etc) Thanks so much!
Excerpt from the recipe: “Yields approximately 4 cups of frosting. This is plenty for my three layer cake. A half batch of this frosting ices 18 cupcakes or more with ease.”
Can this be frozen for use later?
I’ve never tried freezing it and unthawing it, so I can’t say. It gets very hard when it’s cold. If you would unthaw it, I’m guessing you would need to beat it with a mixer again to bring it back to a smooth texture, and then it might be OK. If you decide to try it, let me know how it works. 🙂
I just found out I’m diabetic. Still learning about the disease but starting to feel better since I’m following the food guidelines. Will I really be able to eat Chocolate Cake and Your Fabulous Frosting ?
I don’t know a lot about diabetes and what is allowed and what’s not. The cake and frosting are sugar-free, so if that’s the only thing you have to watch out for, you should be just fine. I know there are a lot of other factors that affect diabetics other than sugar, though, so I would definitely ask a doctor for advice. One word of caution: I’ve heard that sugar alcohols such as xylitol and erythritol can sometimes be a problem for diabetics, so you might want to watch out for that and use stevia instead. Again, check with a doctor.
pretty sure i could devour a bowl of this mocha frosting straight, it looks seriously chocolaty and delicious.
Can I use nunaturals instead of THM sweet blend?
Thank you!
You can do whatever you like. 🙂 Experiment. Here’s a chart that might help you: http://www.trimhealthymama.com/main-home/sweetener-conversion-chart/