Jack Skellington Cake Recipe

top view photo of a Jack Skellington cake that looks like a skeleton face using black cocoa to get a stark black eye and mouth details on top of a multi-layered chocolate cake with white vanilla cheesecake frosting in between.

Author Erin Dooner

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Servings 24

Prep Time 1

Cook Time 26

Total Time 7 30

This Jack Skellington cake features a super moist chocolate base with vanilla and black cocoa cream cheese frosting. The stripes and face are easier to decorate than they look! You can use all-purpose, whole wheat, or gluten-free flour.

Ingredients

Frosting:

▢ 24 ounces (680 grams) full-fat cream cheese room temperature
▢ 18 tablespoons (253 grams) unsalted butter DIVIDED, room temp
▢ 3 3/4 cups (450 grams) powdered sugar
▢ 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
▢ pinch of salt
▢ 1/3 cup (37 grams) black cocoa powder

Instructions

Make the cake:

Preheat your oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line 3 round 8" cake pans with parchment paper on the bottom and grease the sides.
In a large bowl, stir together the sugar, flour, Dutch-process cocoa, black cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
3 cups (600 grams) granulated sugar, 2 1/2 cups + 2 tablespoons (328-363 grams) flour, 15 tablespoons (108 grams) Dutch-process cocoa powder, 3 tablespoons (21 grams) black cocoa powder, 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder, 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda, 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla.
3 large eggs, 1 1/2 cups (355 ml) milk, 3/4 cup (177 ml) olive, canola or vegetable oil, 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
Mix until combined, and then stir in the boiling water. The batter will be quite thin.
1 cup + 2 tablespoons (266 grams) boiling water
Divide the batter between the three pans. That’s 658 grams of batter per pan (675 grams per pan if using Bob's GF flour).
Bake for 26-28 minutes or until a toothpick comes out with some moist crumbs, but no uncooked liquid.
Let cool for 10 minutes in the pans, and then turn out onto a rack to cool completely, about 2 hours. My cakes weren't flat, but not very rounded, either. If you want to, you can level them (I did not).
Unfrosted cake layers can be wrapped in plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for 2 days or refrigerated for 3. They can also be frozen to make the crumb coat tidier. I recommend at least chilling the cake overnight before stacking the layers, but freezing is even better.

Prepare the frosting:

In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese and only 3/4 cup (169 grams) butter together with an electric hand mixer at medium speed until well combined. It's okay if it looks a little crumbly.
24 ounces (680 grams) full-fat cream cheese, 12 tablespoons (168.65 grams) unsalted butter
Gradually beat in the powdered sugar until totally combined, and then beat in the vanilla and salt.
3 3/4 cups (450 grams) powdered sugar, 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract, pinch of salt
Remove 1/3 or 429 grams of the frosting to a medium mixing bowl and add 1/3 cup (37 grams) black cocoa powder to that. Beat in on low until combined. Set aside.
1/3 cup (37 grams) black cocoa powder
To the large mixing bowl with the remaining 2/3 of the frosting, add 6 tablespoons (84 grams) butter. Beat until well combined.
6 tablespoons (84.35 grams) unsalted butter
Mine was firm enough to frost the cake with. If yours isn't, place it in the fridge, stirring every 15 minutes, until it's firm enough.

Assemble the cake:

Place the bottom layer of cake, rounded side down, on the serving dish.
Spread 3/4 cup + 2 tablespoons (200 grams) of vanilla frosting over the bottom layer, almost until the edge.
Put on the next cake layer, rounded side down, and spread on the same amount of vanilla frosting over the top.
Place the third cake layer on top, rounded side up.

Crumb coat:

Use 1/2 cup (115 grams) of vanilla frosting as a crumb coat. Keep the frosting refrigerated until ready to use. And if you ever think it's not firm enough, place it back in the fridge.
Spread it all around JUST the sides of the cake.
Spread 1/2 cup (115 grams) of black frosting over the top of the cake. The first stripe going down the cake will (likely) be black, so you don't have to fuss with making the frosting on the top look perfect around the edges.
Place the cake in the freezer for 20-30 minutes after putting on the crumb coat (or 1-2 hours in the fridge). You can also refrigerate it overnight to help break up the workload.

Make the stripes:

To make the stripes (make sure your frosting isn't runny - it should be easy to pipe), I used a piping bag that had a 1.6cm (2/3") wide opening when laying the bag flat. When you open the bag, the hole was about 1cm (.4in).
Cut two disposable bags, so you have the right size hole, or use a tip that has that size.
Fill one bag with black frosting and one with vanilla frosting.
Start by piping a ring of black frosting around the base of the cake. See post for video.
Then make a white stripe over the black, and alternate until you get to the top.
Use a bench scraper to smooth out the sides by turning the cake with one hand while you drag the bench scraper against the frosting with your other hand. See post for video.

Make the face:

Use a toothpick to outline a Jack Skellington face. Pipe the white frosting around the outline. Fill in the face with frosting.
Then make an outline of the eyes, nose and mouth, and fill them in by piping on black frosting.
Place the cake in the fridge for 4-8 hours, or overnight, so that it's easier to get a nice cut. How long you need depends on if the cake layers are already frozen and if/how long you chilled the frosting before and during the decorating process. With my very warm kitchen and not chilling the cake or the frosting, 4 hours was enough to firm it up. 8 hours would have been better for a cleaner slice.
Refrigerate covered for up to 4 days or freeze (whole or sliced) for up to 3 months.

Notes

For the flour, you can use all-purpose flour, white whole wheat flour or whole wheat flour. If you're gluten-free, use 2 1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons (363 grams) Bob's Red Mill 1-to-1 Gluten-free Baking Flour. I tried this cake 6 times with the King Arthur Gluten-free Measure for Measure Flour, tweaking it a bit each time, and it sank every time.
If you want to use chia eggs instead of regular eggs, mix together 3 tablespoons of ground chia seed with 1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon (133 grams) of water until well combined. Let it sit for about 1-2 minutes or until it's goopy like regular eggs. You can use whatever type of milk you want.
If you're using canned coconut milk, water it down so that it's runny like regular milk. It still might add some coconut flavor to the cake. I would recommend a more neutral milk.
If you live outside of the US/Canada/Australia, you likely have a different type of cream cheese than in the US. US cream cheese is firmer and meant for baking, rather than the kind for toast, like in Europe. For 8 ounces (225 grams) of cream cheese, buy a 300-gram package (the stuff at Aldi, Lidl, etc. works just as well as Philadelphia), put it in the center of a clean tea towel or cheesecloth, and squeeze out the liquid until you have 225 grams of cream cheese. So for this recipe, buy 900 grams of cream cheese and squeeze out the liquid until you have 680 grams of cream cheese left. Also note that medium eggs in the EU = US large eggs.
If you're in the EU, you need medium eggs.
Cake based adapted from Hershey's One Bowl Chocolate Cake.

Nutrition

Calories: 528.6kcalCarbohydrates: 67.8gProtein: 6.5gFat: 27.6gSaturated Fat: 13.4gPolyunsaturated Fat: 4.9gMonounsaturated Fat: 7gTrans Fat: 0.4gCholesterol: 74.8mgSodium: 346.9mgPotassium: 174.2mgFiber: 2.5gSugar: 45.4gVitamin A: 712.3IUCalcium: 77.7mgIron: 2mgNet Carbs: 65

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