The One Frozen Cake Brand That Isn't Worthy Of Your Sugar Craving

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There's a whole industry dedicated to making it easier for dessert lovers to bake cakes, from boxed cake mixes to frozen cakes. And Tasting Table has tasted and ranked many packaged cake mixes. However, as easy as cake mixes are, frozen cakes are the ultimate convenience, prompting us to do some research of our own to figure out which brands are the best — and to find the one frozen cake brand that's decidedly not worthy of your sugar craving.

In our ranking of 6 store-bought frozen cakes, the Taste of Inspirations chocolate lava cake came in last place. The criteria for our ranking focused primarily on taste and texture, and this lava cake failed to deliver on both accounts. Instead of a rich, sophisticated chocolate flavor, these lava cakes tasted more like cheap, chalky hot chocolate mix. The texture of the cake crumb was disappointingly dry, too. And while the gooey center might've been a saving grace, the magic of the molten lava was completely ruined by a majorly flawed design in the packaging.

You're supposed to microwave these individual cakes in the plastic tin they're packaged with, but the cake sticks to the tin as it's nuked. Trying to get the lava cake out of its tin effectively destroyed its structural integrity as the cake was severed in half, spilling a puddle of gooey chocolate with half the cake broken to bits and the other half still stuck to the tin. It was less than satisfying.

While Taste of Inspirations lava cake is the frozen store-bought cake you should absolutely avoid, there are plenty of other options out there. Customers across the interwebs have weighed in on brands that make a delicious lava cake that's easy to nuke! For example, Aldi's brand of chocolate lava cake peels right out of its packaging without breaking so that you can microwave it on a separate plate. Customers on Reddit praised Aldi's lava cake for delivering a large portion, and it comes in a caramel-filled variation in addition to the molten chocolate.

The chocolate lava cake from Trader Joe's has a large following, with glowing reviews on both YouTube and Instagram. Plus, it succeeds with the same simple format that failed so miserably with the Taste of Inspirations brand. The Trader Joe's cake has a decadently moist, melt-in-your-mouth texture and a complex chocolate flavor. 

If you're looking for a brand to order off Amazon, the Aplenty Ultimate chocolate lava cake received high reviews for its super chocolatey flavor and gooey texture. Plus, it's flourless, so you can serve it to gluten-sensitive friends. One thing most reviewers agreed on is serving this cake with a scoop of ice cream. We ranked Van Leeuwen vanilla ice cream as our favorite popular ice cream brand for quality ingredients. Vanilla ice cream will not only complement a lava cake's flavor, it'll also help compensate for a dry crumb by delivering a cooling contrast.