Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake

24 Servings
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Refrigerate 30 minutes
Total Time 1 hour 20 minutes

Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake is a kid-favorite Halloween recipe topped with pudding, crushed Oreos (dirt), and gummy worms for a spooky treat.

This delicious and easy Cake Recipe is the perfect dessert for a Halloween party. For more spooky treats, try my Halloween Bark and Halloween Rice Krispies!

Sabrina’s Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake Recipe

If you need a dessert recipe perfect for your next Halloween party, then look no further than this Oreo Dirt Cake! It is inspired by a classic no-bake Dirt Pudding, which is pudding cups topped with Oreo crumbs and candy worms. Basically you take the same concept but layer it over a delicious, easy chocolate sheet cake. It’s a fun idea for a chocolaty party-sized dessert that is perfect for the spooky season!

Recipe Card

Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake

Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake is a kid-favorite Halloween recipe topped with pudding, crushed Oreos (dirt), and gummy worms for a spooky treat.
Yield 24 Servings
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Total Time 1 hour 20 minutes
Course Dessert
Cuisine American
Author Sabrina Snyder

Ingredients
 

Chocolate Cake:

  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1 3/4 cups flour
  • 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 cup whole milk
  • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 1 cup hot coffee , you can substitute boiling water

Chocolate Pudding

  • 6 ounces chocolate pudding mix
  • 2 cups whole milk

Chocolate Frosting:

  • 1 1/2 cups unsalted butter
  • 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 6 cups powdered sugar
  • 2/3 cups milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla

Toppings:

  • 26 Oreo Cookies , crushed into crumbs
  • 10 ounces gummy worms

Instructions

Chocolate Sheet Cake

  • Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and spray a 9×13 baking pan with baking spray.
  • In a stand mixer on low speed mix together the sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
  • In a small bowl whisk together the eggs, milk, oil and vanilla then add it to the stand mixer on low then medium speed until just combined, and finally add in the hot coffee carefully and stir it in by hand until just combined (do not turn on the mixer, it may splash on you).
  • Pour half of the batter into each of the pans and bake for 30-35 minutes then remove and let it cool completely.

Chocolate Pudding:

  • Whisk together pudding mix and milk until smooth.
  • Let sit for 5 minutes.
  • Spread the pudding over completely cooled cake.
  • Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Chocolate Frosting:

  • Melt the butter in a large saucepan and whisk in the cocoa powder then remove from the heat and let cool.
  • Add the cooled chocolate mixer to your stand mixer and whip on medium speed adding the powdered sugar and milk, alternating them ⅓ at a time, and finally add the vanilla in last.
  • If the frosting is too thick, add a bit more milk.
  • Spread the frosting over the pudding layer.

Toppings:

  • Top with crushed Oreos and gummy worms, pressing in gently.

Nutrition

Calories: 526kcal | Carbohydrates: 84g | Protein: 6g | Fat: 21g | Saturated Fat: 13g | Cholesterol: 49mg | Sodium: 357mg | Potassium: 253mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 63g | Vitamin A: 439IU | Calcium: 73mg | Iron: 3mg

How to Make

Time needed: 1 hour and 20 minutes

  1. Prep time

    To prep the recipe set your oven temperature to 350 degrees and spray two 9×13 inch pans with nonstick spray. Next, get the crushed Oreos ready. Make the Oreo crumbs in a food processor and leave them to the side until you’re ready to decorate the cake. This is also a good time to brew coffee so that it’s ready to go.

  2. Chocolate Sheet Cake

    Combine the granulated sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in your stand mixer. If you don’t have a stand mixer, you can use a large mixing bowl and electric mixer. Whisk together the eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla in a separate bowl, then add it to your dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Slowly pour in the hot coffee. Stir it in by hand, that way the coffee doesn’t splash up and burn you.Cake batter in mixing bowl

  3. Bake

    Pour half the batter into each of the prepared pans and bake them for 30-35 minutes.Cake batter in baking dish

  4. Pudding mixture

    Whisk the chocolate pudding mix with the milk. Let the pudding mixture sit for 5 minutes to start to set and thicken.Chocolate pudding in mixing bowl

  5. Set Pudding

    Spoon the pudding mixture over a cooled cake. (You don’t want it hot or the pudding will melt). Spread out evenly with a rubber spatula, then let it set fully in the fridge.Pudding layer over baked cake in dish

  6. Frosting

    While the cake is cooling make the chocolate frosting. Melt the butter in a saucepan and mix in cocoa powder. Once they’re combined remove them from the heat and let the mixture cool. Add the chocolate to your stand mixer and whip it together. Alternate between adding the powdered sugar and milk in ⅓ cup amounts. Then add in the vanilla. Pour in extra milk if the frosting is too thick.

  7. Frost

    Gently spread a thick layer of frosting over the entire cake, spreading to make it even. It’s okay if a little pudding mixes in the frosting.Frosted cake in pan before decorating.

  8. Decorate

    Cover the frosting before it sets with crushed Oreo crumbs and gummy worms, pressing them in lightly so they stick..
    Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake with pudding, crushed oreos, and gummy worms on top in baking dish

How To Store

  • Serve: Because of the pudding in the cake, you don’t want to leave it at room temperature for more than 2 hours.
  • Store: You can wrap the recipe in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for 1 week.
  • Freeze: Kept sealed, the cake will be good in the freezer for 4-6 months. Let it thaw in the fridge before serving.

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Variations

  • Cream Cheese Frosting: Try making this cake recipe with chocolate cream cheese frosting. Start by whipping together 8 ounces of softened cream cheese and 8 tablespoons of butter. Next, mix in 3 cups powdered sugar, ½ cup cocoa powder, ¼ teaspoon salt, and 1 teaspoon vanilla.
  • Vanilla Pudding: To change things up a little, try making vanilla pudding. You could change up the cake to a beach theme by using the vanilla pudding and golden Oreos to look like sand instead of dirt. Top it with Swedish fish and gummy sharks.
  • Chocolate chips: For some extra chocolaty taste, try mixing chocolate chips into the cake batter. Semi-sweet, milk, dark, or white chocolate chips will all make a nice addition.
  • Dirt Cake Cups: Bake the cake batter in a muffin tin then transfer the cupcakes to small cups and top with pudding, frosting and decorations as usual. You could also bake the cupcakes in special decorative wrappers that have tall sides to hold all the topping layers.
Close up shot of dirt cake from an angle

Cakes For A Crowd

Collage of cake in pan and preparation steps

The following pics were used in previous versions of this post:

Decorated cake in baking dish with slice missing
Collage of prep steps
Lifting slice out of pan of decorated cake.

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.

Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.

She is also the author of the cookbook Dinner, then Dessert – Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients, published by Harper Collins.

She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.

As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.

Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.

As a member of the community of food website creators Sabrina Snyder has spoken at many conferences regarding her experiences as a food writer including the Indulge Food Conference, Everything Food Conference, Haven Food Conference and IACP Annual Food Professionals Conference.

Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.

Dinner, then Dessert, Inc. owns the copyright on all images and text and does not allow for its original recipes and pictures to be reproduced anywhere other than at this site unless authorization is given. Read my disclosure and copyright policy. This post may contain affiliate links.

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Comments

  1. I wanted to love this but the recipe is written confusing and the frosting was like soup and it just slid it and the pudding layer off of the cake! It’s more like a molten lava dirt cake at this point! Still good but messy as heck!

  2. Bake in a single pan. Cool. Poke some holes for worms to “come out” of the cake. Put in worms. Cover cake with pudding and crumble oreos on top, adding more worms. This was a hit for the fam and making it again by request, even though it doesn’t fit my daughter’s birthday theme like it did my son’s. The recipe is written weird. No need for two pans/layers or making frosting– the Oreos and pudding are plenty if the cake is nice and moist!

  3. I see the questions being asked but I don’t see an answer that addresses the fact that the recipe includes instructions for pudding AND frosting. So do I need to make both or just the pudding? I bought the ingredients for this before reading through the instructions. I wish I hadn’t, now I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do.

    1. You make a sheet cake
      You make the frosting
      You make the pudding

      I recommend that you read the Tips for making Chocolate Pudding Dirt Cake for further clarification.
      Let us know how your recipe turned out!

    1. The Chocolate Cake is topped off with a chocolate pudding mixture, then it’s all topped off with cookie crumbs and gummy worms to look like worms in dirt. Enjoy!

  4. This whole recipe is confusing. How many pans, 1 or 2? And what layer goes on top of cake first, frosting or pudding? ?

  5. This whole recipe is confusing. How many pans, 1 or 2? And what layer goes on top of cake first, frosting or pudding? ?