Easy Marble Bundt Cake
This moist, soft Marble Bundt Cake tastes fantastic and is so easy to make with cake mix! If you can't decide between yellow cake or chocolate cake, this marble bundt cake is the answer. It is SO good, and so pretty when sliced!
We have used this recipe for our easy marble layer cake in the past, and today we decided to try it as a bundt cake. Keep this recipe in mind for your next dessert- you will love it!
Table of Contents
Ingredients for Easy Marble Bundt Cake
You can find the full, printable recipe at the bottom of this post. Here is a quick look at our ingredients.
- Yellow Cake Mix (we used Duncan Hines Perfectly Moist, 15.25 oz)
- Small Instant Vanilla Pudding Mix (Don't prepare the pudding)
- Sugar
- All Purpose Flour
- Sour Cream (we like "full fat" rather than reduced)
- Eggs
- Vanilla
- Water
- Vegetable Oil
- For the Chocolate Marbling Step: Unsweetened Cocoa Powder + Hot Water
- Optional Chocolate Glaze (chocolate chips + heavy whipping cream)
How to Make the Recipe
You can find detailed steps in the printable recipe card below. Here is a quick overview!
- Prepare the bundt pan and preheat the oven to 325F. Either grease the pan with vegetable shortening and lightly flour, or use *baking spray which contains flour (rather than cooking spray.) We used baking spray today.
- We prepared the yellow cake batter according to our recipe card instructions (ignore the recipe on the back of the cake mix).
- Chocolate Batter: Next, we scooped two cups of yellow cake batter into a medium sized bowl and added our cocoa+hot water mixture, gently stirring until it became a uniform chocolate color.
- Marbling: We layered the batter in our prepared bundt pan. We alternated two layers of yellow batter with two layers of chocolate batter. This is not an exact science ;0)
- Here's what it looked like just before baking.
- After baking, we allowed the cake to cool in the pan on a wire rack for ten minutes before turning it out.
- You can see how the cake domes up a bit as it bakes. If you are using a plain tube pan, you may decide to have the dome side up. If you have a decorative bundt pan like we used, it is a good idea to gently trim away some of the dome before turning out so that it sits more level on the cake plate.
- Allow the cake to cool for about 10 minutes before turning it out. (We used a Nordic Ware braided bundt pan today but any bundt pan is fine as long as it is not filled more than approximately ⅔ full).
Chocolate Ganache Glaze
The cake is delicious just as it is, but we decided to top the cooled cake with a chocolate glaze for an added layer of rich chocolate flavor. (If you prefer frosting, a half batch of chocolate buttercream is a great choice too!)
Here's our finished cake! I love the look of the marbling. We've learned over the years that it is almost impossible to predict what the marbling will look like from pan to pan or recipe to recipe (or even from slice to slice) but it is always pretty!
We added some mini chocolate chips as a final touch. This cake is SO good, we hope that you enjoy it as much as we have. Thanks so much for stopping by today!
More Bundt Cakes
We've made many bundt cakes and pound cakes over the years! Some of our favorites are our classic pound cake, marble pound cake, red velvet bundt cake, and easy pumpkin bundt cake!
Thanks so much for visiting our site today, please come back often! If you give this cake recipe a try, we would love for you to let us know what you think in the comments below.
Have you made this? We would LOVE for you to leave a ⭐️ rating as well as a comment and photo below! We really appreciate your feedback!
Easy Marble Bundt Cake Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 (15.25 oz) Box Yellow Cake Mix (We used Duncan Hines Moist Yellow Cake)
- ½ cup All Purpose Flour (60g)
- ½ cup sugar (100g)
- 1 (3.9 oz) small box Vanilla Instant Pudding Mix. (We use Jello Brand-Do not make pudding, just add the dry powder.)
- 1 cup Sour Cream (227g) (We used "full fat")
- ½ cup Vegetable Oil (we use canola) (108g)
- 1 ¼ cup water (302g)
- 3 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract (10g)
For the Marbling
- 2 cups of the yellow cake batter
- 4 Tablespoons Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
- 4 Tablespoons Hot Water
For the Chocolate Glaze (optional)
- 4 oz Semi-Sweet or Dark Chocolate Today we used Ghirardelli mini semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 3 oz Heavy Whipping Cream
Optional Topping
- We sprinkled mini chocolate chips over our glaze.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour (or spray with *baking spray) a tube pan or bundt pan. *see notes for pan details
- In the bowl of your mixer, add the yellow cake mix, all purpose flour, sugar, and vanilla instant pudding mix. Whisk to blend.
- Add the remaining ingredients to the bowl. Mix on low speed for about 15 seconds.
- Then, increase mixer to medium speed and mix for two minutes. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. The batter should look well blended.
For the Chocolate Batter
- In a small bowl, dissolve the 4 tablespoons of cocoa powder with 4 tablespoons of very hot water and allow to sit for at least 3 minutes.
- Scoop two cups of yellow cake batter into a small bowl. Add the cocoa mixture and gently stir until the two cups of batter take on a uniform chocolate color.
Filling the Pans and Marbling
- Add about half of the yellow cake batter to the bundt cake pan. Then, layer about half of the chocolate batter on top of that. Repeat with the remaining yellow batter followed by the remaining chocolate batter.
- Finally, we tapped the filled bundt pan on the countertop and gave it a quick twist back and forth to level out the batter. (We did not run a knife through the layers of batter this time but you can do this sparingly if you'd like!)
- We baked the cake at 325 F for about 40-45 minutes ** Baking times will vary. Peek in as the end time approaches and adjust accordingly. When an inserted toothpick comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs attached, it is ready.
- Move the freshly baked bundt cake to a cooling rack and cool for 10 minutes before turning out. **Your cake will likely bake up with a dome. Since we used a decorative pan, we gently trimmed some of the dome away so that once inverted, the cake would sit more level on the cake pedestal.
For the Chocolate Glaze
- Combine the 4 oz. semi-sweet or dark chocolate and 3 oz. heavy cream in a microwave safe bowl. Heat in the microwave in small increments (30 seconds or less), stirring occasionally in between, until the chocolate is *almost* completely melted.Allow the mixture to sit for a minute or two and stir until smooth.
- This glaze will thicken as it sits and cools. Spoon over the cooled cake, or drizzle using a disposable piping bag (or ziplock bag) with the tip/corner snipped away. (Use however much of the glaze you'd like!) As an optional step, we sprinkled ours with mini chocolate chips.
Storing and Serving
- The cake is fine for 2-3 days at room temperature in an airtight container or under a cake dome. Beyond that, we recommend moving to the refrigerator for freshness.
- The cake is best at room temperature (rather than chilled). If you've refrigerated the cake, remove from the refrigerator at least a couple of hours before serving so that it can come closer to room temperature.