Tender sponge cake layers are brushed with a chocolate liqueur syrup and then spread with a luscious cannoli frosting, perfectly creamy and fluffy.
Cannoli cake is a take on the beloved Italian cannoli pastry. I personally think it's even better in cake form. The fluffy, tender sponge cake layers are infused with a chocolate liqueur syrup and the frosting inside the cake is made with the trifecta of Italian cheeses - cream cheese, mascarpone, and ricotta. Doesn't that sound heavenly? Smooth and creamy, this filling is so luscious and isn't too sweet.
From all the cakes that our family makes, this is definitely in the top 5. And between all my sisters, mom and myself, there's a lot of cake baking happening. Elina was the first one who started making this cake and it has become our go-to for many parties, special events and just when we crave some good cake.
After making this cake for almost ten years, I've been adjusting the recipe until I got it "just right". I use the base sponge cake for many of the cakes that I make and the cannoli cream is great to use not only in cakes but also for pastries and cupcakes too.
Instructions:
Sponge Cake Layers:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line the bottom of 2 round (9 inch) cake pans with parchment paper.
Separate the eggs, putting the whites in one bowl and the yolks in another.
Beat the whites using a whisk attachment on a standing mixer or a hand held mixer until foamy. Gradually pour in half of the sugar. Mix the whites on high speed until stiff peaks form. Set aside.
In the other bowl with the yolks, add the remaining sugar and use the same whisk attachment to beat the yolks until they are pale and fluffy.
Combine the milk, melted butter, and vanilla extract in a bowl or cup. Set aside.
Using a rubber spatula, fold the egg whites into the egg yolks, being careful not to deflate the batter as much as possible. 
Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt over the folded eggs and gently fold in the batter.
When there are still some remaining streaks of flour, pour in the milk and butter mixture into the batter by the side of the bowl.
Continue gently folding until evenly distributed.
Divide the batter in half, pouring into the prepared cake pans.
Bake in the preheated oven until they are golden and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, 20-25 minutes. 
Cool on a wire rack.
Meanwhile, prepare the chocolate liqueur syrup, the cannoli filling, and the frosting.
Chocolate Liqueur Syrup:
Make a simple sugar by heating the sugar and water in a small pot until sugar dissolves and add the chocolate liqueur. Set aside to cool.
Filling and Frosting:
In a standing mixer with a paddle attachment or using a hand mixer, cream the cream cheese and powdered sugar. 
Add the mascarpone cheese and vanilla. You can just fold in the mascarpone cheese with a rubber spatula, since it's soft enough or mix with the mixer just until combined, about 30 seconds. 
Pour in the cold heavy cream and starting mixing the mixture on low speed, gradually increasing to high speed. 
Mix until the heavy cream is incorporated into the frosting, becomes thick and fluffy.
Set aside half of the mixture in a medium bowl. This will be the frosting. Set aside.
Add the ricotta cheese to the second part. This is the cannoli filling. Set aside as well.
Assembling the Cake:
Cut each cake in half horizontally.
Using a serrated knife, make a small cut all around the outside of the cake. This will keep your knife on the same level as you are cutting across. Continue cutting deeper into the cake until you have cut all the way through.
Another trick I use when decorating cakes is to line the serving plate all around the edge with aluminum foil so that the edge of the cake is overlapping the aluminum foil by about ½ inch. This will catch all the drips and crumbs, leaving your serving plate neat and clean. When you're done decorating just carefully pull the aluminum foil out.
Using a pastry brush, brush the top and bottom of each layer with the chocolate liqueur syrup.
Spread ⅓ of the Cannoli filling over the cake layer.
Repeat with the rest of the cake layers, brushing the chocolate liqueur syrup over both sides of the cake layer and spreading the cannoli filling over the other two cake layers. You can sprinkle mini chocolate chips over the filling. I only sprinkled chocolate chips over the middle layer, leaving them out of the first and third layers, but it's completely up to you.
Use the frosting to cover the top and sides of the cake.
Cover the sides of the cake with cake crumbs, any nuts that you like or chocolate chips. I used some leftover scraps from another cake that I was making, putting the cake scraps into a food processor to get fine crumbs. Cup a handful of crumbs or nuts in your palm with one hand and holding the cake with the other hand, slightly turn it, press the crumbs/nuts all around the sides of the cake.
I piped some buttercream frosting around the top of the cake and sprinkled the decorative dollops with mini chocolate chips. Adding some mini cannolis to the top of the cake gives everyone a hint of what kind of cake this is. For best results, refrigerate the cake for 2-4 hours so that the cake has time to meld together and the filling and frosting soak into the cake. I prefer to do this overnight. Store the cake in the refrigerator, but let it come to room temperature for about 20 minutes before serving it, so that the cannoli filling softens and becomes so velvety and smooth.
Cannoli Cake
Tender sponge cake layers are brushed with a chocolate liqueur syrup and then spread with a luscious cannoli frosting, perfectly creamy and fluffy.
- Prep Time: 2 hours
- Cook Time: 25 mins
- Total Time: 2 hours 25 mins
- Yield: 1 (9 inch) round cake 1x
- Category: Sweets
Ingredients
Sponge Cake Layers: (makes 2 (9 inch) sponge cake layers)
- 8 eggs, separated, room temperature
- 1 cup sugar, divided
- ½ cup milk and melted butter, total (¼ cup each)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1½ cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
Syrup:
- ¾ cup water
- ¼ cup sugar
- ⅓ cup chocolate liqueur
Filling and Frosting:
- 2 (8 oz) pkg cream cheese, softened
- 1 ½ cups powdered sugar (or to taste)
- 8 oz mascarpone cheese
- 1 ¼ cups ricotta cheese
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ cup heavy cream, chilled
- Mini chocolate chips, for decorating
Instructions
Sponge Cake:
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line the bottom of 2 round (9 inch round) cake pans with parchment paper.
- Separate the eggs, putting the whites in one bowl and the yolks in another.
- Beat the whites using a whisk attachment on a standing mixer or a hand-held mixer until foamy. Gradually pour in half of the sugar. Mix the whites on high speed until stiff peaks form. Set aside.
- In the other bowl with the yolks, add the remaining sugar and use the same whisk attachment to beat the yolks until they are pale and fluffy.
- Combine the milk, melted butter, and vanilla extract in a bowl or cup. Set aside.
- Using a rubber spatula, fold the egg whites into the egg yolks, being careful not to deflate the batter as much as possible.
- Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt over the folded eggs and gently fold in the batter.
- When there are still some remaining streaks of flour, pour in the milk and butter mixture into the batter by the side of the bowl.
- Continue gently folding until evenly distributed.
- Divide the batter in half, pouring into the prepared cake pans.
- Bake in the preheated oven until they are golden and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, 20-25 minutes.
- Cool on a wire rack.
- Meanwhile, prepare the chocolate liqueur syrup, the cannoli filling, and the frosting.
Chocolate Liqueur Syrup:
- Make a simple sugar by heating the sugar and water in a small pot until sugar dissolves and add the chocolate liqueur. Set aside to cool.
Filling and Frosting:
- In a standing mixer with a paddle attachment or using a hand mixer, cream the cream cheese and powdered sugar.
- Add the mascarpone cheese and vanilla. You can just fold in the mascarpone cheese with a rubber spatula, since it's soft enough or mix with the mixer just until combined, about 30 seconds.
- Pour in the cold heavy cream and starting mixing the mixture on low speed, gradually increasing to high speed.
- Mix until the heavy cream is incorporated into the frosting, becomes thick and fluffy.
- Set aside half of the mixture in a medium bowl. This will be the frosting. Set aside.
- Add the ricotta cheese to the second part. This is the cannoli filling. Set aside as well.
Assembling the Cake:
- Cut each cake in half horizontally.
- Using a pastry brush, brush the top and bottom of each layer with the chocolate liqueur syrup.
- Spread ⅓ of the Cannoli filling over the cake layer.
- Repeat with the rest of the cake layers, brushing the chocolate liqueur syrup over both sides of the cake layer and spreading the cannoli filling over the other two cake layers. You can sprinkle mini chocolate chips over the filling. I only sprinkled chocolate chips over the middle layer, leaving them out of the first and third layers, but it's completely up to you.
- Use the frosting to cover the top and sides of the cake.
- Cover the sides of the cake with cake crumbs, any nuts that you like or chocolate chips. I used some leftover scraps from another cake that I was making, putting the cake scraps into a food processor to get fine crumbs. Cup a handful of crumbs or nuts in your palm with one hand and holding the cake with the other hand, slightly turn it, press the crumbs/nuts all around the sides of the cake.
- I piped some buttercream frosting around the top of the cake and sprinkled the decorative dollops with mini chocolate chips. Adding some mini cannolis to the top of the cake gives everyone a hint of what kind of cake this is.
- For best results, refrigerate the cake for 2-4 hours so that the cake has time to meld together and the filling and frosting soak into the cake. I prefer to do this overnight.
- Store the cake in the refrigerator, but let it come to room temperature for about 20 minutes before serving it, so that the cannoli filling softens and becomes so velvety and smooth.
Can I bake the cake layers couple of days in advance? like if i bake today and then assemble it tomorrow for Saturday party?
BTW love your site!
Thanks
Can I substitute some thing else for the Chocolate liqueur?
You can make any kind of syrup that you like. I like the chocolate liqueur. You can make a peach syrup, for example.
Yes, Nadia. You can bake the cake layers ahead of time.
My cakes turned out really low, like they weren't even high enough for me to cut them in half. Any ideas as to what I could have done wrong? I followed the recipe exactly, or so I thought I did.
Hi Tanya,
It could be a number of different things. I talked about different issues with cake baking in a post called 8 Cake Baking Tips. Check it out.
Hi! A friend of mine has made a cake like this before and i'm almost positive it was this recipe, but needless to say it was absoluteley incredible and I am going to attemp to make it myself! I was reading the cake tips, and about using less sugar...do you recommend using less sugar from what your recipe says, or are you saying that for any recipe in general? i guess what i'am wondering is would i use, say 5 tablespoons instead of 10?! just curious:)
Thank you
Hi Erin,
Glad you stopped by!
In the cake tips, I was talking about other recipes in general. For the recipes that I have here, I already reduced the sugar.
Thank you for the clarification! Also, if i wanted to make it into a rectangular cake, what size pans would you recommend loaf pans or 8x8 pans?
Hi Erin,
How big do you want the cake to be?
I would probably double the recipe and make it in a 13x9 inch baking pan.
Olga thank you so much for your website, first time writing comment, mnogo recipes try from your blog (loved). Have some voprosik, if i dont have 2 odinokovux cake pans, testo mozna ostavit v xolodilnike kogda spechetsya pervuj tort (korzh), kak zdelat mozhna ?
Hi Natalka!
I'm glad you're enjoying the blog:).
Yes, you can wait until the first cake bakes and then bake the second one, however, it might not rise as much, since the beaten eggs will deflate with time.
oh and I did not have mascarpone cheese I will have to follow the recipe exact next time.. 🙂
I have made this cake for my husbands birthday party... And can truly say EVERYONE loved it.. I did make just few tiny changes,, i did not have the chocolate liquor so i used coffee, and i did not use sugar in the frosting but used half of can cooked condensed milk.. The cake was awesome!!! The beskvit was soo good and I am not a big fan of biscviti, but this one yammm!! Thanks for the recipe..So simple but so good.
HI I JUST WANTED TO DOUBLE CHECK WHEN U SAY TO REPEAT WITH EGG YOLKS FOR THE CAKE PART DO YOU MEAN TO WHIP THEM UNTIL SOFT PEAKS FORM AS WELL AS THE EGG WHITES?
Yes, whip the egg yolks also. "Repeat with the egg yolks and the remaining 5 Tablespoons of sugar, until pale yellow and thick."
where exactly can i find mascorpone? freezer? is it diff from cool whip?
Mascarpone cheese is a creamy, rich cheese which can be found in most grocery stores in the same area as other refrigerayed specialty cheeses. It is most commonly found on Tiramisu cake and is very different from Cool Whip.
ok thanks
So I made this cake last night,and can I say this is hands down one of new favorites. Yummy doesn't describe it :)))
Thank you olya, I gonna make this cake. P.s you have an awesome blog going keep it up; )
Thank you, Nadia:)
Do you have to use cake flour or can it be substitute for all purpose flour.
For this recipe you do have to use cake flour.
Have you or your sister converted the recipe to make cupcakes. If so could/would you send me the directions (in detail)if possible. Forgive me I am Slovak married to an Italian who loves cannoli's!!!
Sorry, Barbara. I have never made this cake into cupcakes.
Why does the recipe say all purpose flour if we are supposed to use cake flour?
Candice, you need to use all purpose flour in this recipe.
Good luck in expanding your delicious recipes. You have a great collection and I hope that you will add more of the Slavic cuisine. I will certaily try a few of your suggestions. Easter dishes and "zakuski" is something I am always looking for, as I love to cook.
thank you again!
Irina Malichek
Wow that truly looks awesome! Beautiful and has all the ingredients of a fabulous cake! Can't wait! Can't wait!!
Oh my! I used to make a cake similar to yours, I knew it as Italian cassatta I think. It was slightly different, but your cake just sounds better! Thanks for providing wonderful pics along with the recipe!
looks great! want to make it!
Olya where do you buy Chocolate Liqueur? is it very expensive?
I bought it in a liquor store, and it's about $20 for a large bottle. You only need to use a small amount, so it will last you a long time.
This looks delicious! can't wait to try it. Thanks.