Italian Love Cake is a super fun cake mix dessert made in a 13x9 inch pan. I found the recipe on Food.com, formerly known as Recipe Genius, and prior to that Recipezaar. It's always been a great source of interesting recipes, and Italian Love Cake is one of them.
The cake seems like an American-Italian recipe that you’d find in church cookbooks from the eastern part of the United States in that it's "Americanized" with the cake mix, pudding mix and Cool Whip, but has Italian dessert qualities such as being less sweet, both cake-y and creamy and really pretty.
Italian Love Cake is also easy! You start with regular cake mix -- any brand will do. Then you mix the batter as directed and pour it in the pan. The second step is to mix together some ricotta, eggs and vanilla which you pour over the top. Here's a lovely photo of mine before it went in the oven.
And here it is after.
Once cooled you mix together some pudding mix and milk, fold in some Cool Whip, then spread over the top.
How Much Pudding Mix in Italian Love Cake?
Recipes differ. Some versions call for a 5.1 oz box of pudding mix while some call for 3.9. And the amount of whipped topping varies too. I went with the 3.8 oz box of pudding mix and used 1 ½ containers (12 oz weight total) of Cool Whip. You could get away with using 1 8-oz carton or maybe 2, but I liked the flavor of 1 ½ cartons. Also, watch for lumps. Whisk the pudding mix and milk really well before folding in the whipped cream. If you do have lumps, no worries. Sprinkle chopped chocolate over the top and no one will notice.
Serving and Freezing
Italian Love Cake makes a brilliant presentation. I used a glass dish because I was in a glass dish mood and it baked up perfectly at 325F. It looks pretty in the dish, but is beautiful when cut and plated. Since there was no way we could eat it all at once, I lifted the cake from the glass dish, cut it in half and froze half. So I'm happy to say it freezes quite well.
Pan Size
Italian Love Cake calls for a 9x13 inch pan, but it's a large cake so make sure your 9x13 inch pan doesn't have short sides or a shape that limits its volume amount. My glass dish worked fine, but I received a note from a reader who had issues fitting her cake into one dish.
8-Inch Glass Dish Half Batch
I recently made a quick half batch Italian Love Cake using half a box of Aldi brand chocolate cake mix (1 ½ cups plus a teaspoon or 7.6 oz weight), 1 egg and 1 yolk, ½ cup water, ¼ cup oil, then 2 cups (1 pound) ricotta, 2 eggs. 6 tablespoons sugar and half teaspoon of vanilla. Topping was ½ a box of pudding mix, ½ cup of milk with ¾ cup heavy cream, whipped and sweetened, folded in. This is just a candid photo to give you an idea of what it looks like. It's much prettier plated! For the half batch, I baked at 325 for only 45 minutes. Time may vary from oven to oven, and some brands of cake mix might rise more or sink more in the middle. In the end it will all work out.
Here's another one. I made another one recently using half of all ingredients and a 2 ½ inch deep 8-inch square dish.
Update in Betty Crocker Cake Mix Size
Thanks to Lynn for testing Italian Love Cake with the new size of Betty Crocker cake mix. The new cake mix size is 13.25 oz. Lynn adjusted the water from 1 ¼ cups to 1 cup and the recipe worked just fine. I've also tested with Duncan Hines using the amounts listed on the box.
Recipe
Italian Love Cake
Ingredients
- 1 13.25 oz box Betty Crocker chocolate cake mix or other brand See note
- 1 cup water
- 3 large eggs
- ½ cup vegetable oil
Ricotta Cheese Mixture
- 1 32 oz container whole milk ricotta cheese
- 4 large eggs (not extra large or jumbo!) -- medium okay
- ¾ cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla or vanilla bean paste
- ½ cup chocolate chips (optional)
Whipped Topping:
- 1 3.8 oz. package instant chocolate pudding mix
- 1 cup cold whole milk
- 2 8 oz containers whipped topping** (You don't have to use both containers as noted below)
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F if using a metal pan and 325 degrees F if using a 9x13 inch glass baking dish. I used 325 and a 9x13 inch glass baking dish. Grease bottom of the pan (or dish). UPDATE: So far I have only ever baked this in glass dishes and used the 325 temp. The old recipe does say 350, but I think 325 is a safer temp. My latest cake, a half batch, was done in 45 minutes.
- In a large mixing bowl, prepare the cake mix as directed on package. In this case that would be Betty Crocker Super Moist, so you mix the mix, water, eggs and oil and beat for 2 minutes. Pour into the baking pan.
- In another bowl, beat together the ricotta cheese, eggs, sugar, and vanilla until smooth. If adding chocolate chips, stir them in.
- Spoon or pour the cheese mixture evenly over the top of the cake batter.
- Bake the cake at 350 for 1 hour or 325 for 1 hour and 5 minutes(if using a glass dish) or until the cake seems firm to touch. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely.
- To make the topping, whisk together the pudding mix and milk. Fold 1 to 1 ½ cartons (8 to 12 oz) of whipped topping into the pudding, then spread all over the cake. Cover and chill overnight (or for at least 4 hours minimum).
Notes
- For the egg, oil and water, use amounts listed on the box. Amount in card is for Betty Crocker, but other brands will differ slightly.
- Use 1 carton of whipped topping plus as much as you need from the second carton. I used 1 ½ cartons.
Anna says
Danab, I've made it many times now. You can definitely make it with half the ricotta mixture. There is a lot of of it and it's not super sweet so it's good for ricotta and cannoli lovers. I feel like some people might prefer the recipe called Double Fudge Fancifill which has a thin cream cheese stripe and is sweeter.
Also, be sure to use the box cake mix recipe here rather than scratch the first time. Another reader and I were experimenting with this. She used an old Hershey's scratch recipe and the cake batter just soaked up most of the ricotta so there was barely a stripe. I think certain scratch batters (probably thick ones with a lot of fat) will work, but ones like Black Magic Cake and Hershey's Perfect with very liquid batters don't work well. You didn't ask about scratch batters, but I'm throwing that out there :).
Danab says
Looks really good! It does look like a lot of ricotta cheese and eggs. Has anyone tried it with a half of the ricotta mixture and the rest a full recipe?
Anna says
Hi Jane! Yes, you are right! The correct amount for a half batch should be 16 oz or half of a 32 oz carton. Just use half of what is in the recipe card because that is what is correct. I hope you like it. It's not a very sweet cake but it's good.
Jane says
This sounds really good! For the 9 x 13 recipe you call for 32 oz (=2 lbs) of ricotta, but for the 8x8 you call for 1 cup (1/2 lb?) of ricotta. Should that be 1 lb of ricotta for the half size cake? Thanks, looking forward to trying this recipe!
Anna says
Teri, the mascarpone filling sounds wonderful! The only problem is I have never tested this with mascarpone or cream cheese and mascarpone is pricey. Rather than risk it in this cake, maybe you could try the Double Fudge Fancill Cake and use mascarpone in place of the cream cheese. Here's a link to that one.
https://www.cookiemadness.net/2012/06/03/double-fudge-fancifill-cake/
Teri Rawn says
Can I use mascarpone cheese instead of ricotta.
Anna says
I think it's more of a serve out of the pan kind of cake, but you could probably come up with some creative way to serve it out of the pan if you really needed to.
Kim says
Can you remove it from the baking pan once cooled?
Anna says
Lynn, thanks so much for trying it! Also, I just discovered the Betty Crocker downsize, so thanks for bringing that up and most of all for making that water adjustment and letting everyone know. That was super helpful.
Lynn A. says
Made the recipe exactly as stated but one note: Betty Crocker Cake mix is now 13.25 oz. so I used 1 cup of water not 1 1/4 c water. I made the cake Saturday for our Sunday dinner and it was amazing! I think it was even better on Monday! The family loved it and commented how light and delicious it was. Will definitely make it again.
Lynn Cappiello says
I have been making this exact recipe for years.I first found the recipe in a local church’s cookbook. It’s always been a hit. I’ve made the chocolate cake/vanilla frosting version and the lemon cake w vanilla frosting. Both are excellent and I plan to experiment with a strawberry cake and pistachio/Nutella frosting.
Sue says
That is very attractive! Seems like a great recipe for a pot luck.
Anna says
It tastes like ricotta cheesecake. Also, this cake is definitely better after a good overnight chill. We cut into it after about 4 or 5 hours and it was good, but the texture was better the second day.
I made the full 13x9 inch recipe which means we will be eating this cake for 1000 years, but once we do finish it I plan on trying a lemon version. Seems like it would work with lemon cake mix, lemon pudding etc.
T. Martin says
Very appealing color contrast... Based on a the flip flop of batters this looks like it falls in the category of a "magic" cake.
What does the ricotta layer taste like?