Oreo Drip Cake!
*This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure for more details!*
A 3-layer chocolate cake, with Oreo buttercream, a chocolate drip, and even more Oreos make a delectable & showstopping Oreo drip cake!
Oreo favourites
One of my dad’s colleagues recently had their last day at work, and because she has been one of my most enthusiastic taste testers (and just the loveliest person ever), I wanted to bake something properly special. Naturally… that meant a drip cake. You know I can never resist making a big showstopper, especially for an occasion.
And even though I didn’t actually get a slice of the finished cake (tragic, I know), I did “accidentally” taste-test several spoonfuls of the buttercream during decorating. Purely for quality control, obviously. The reviews from the office were glowing… apparently it disappeared within minutes!
I’ve been itching to make another Oreo bake for a while, and turning it into a full drip cake felt perfect. The Oreo buttercream alone is enough to convert anyone.
The sponge
I used the same idea for the cake from my Salted Caramel Drip Cake and my Biscoff Drip Cake, just using less self-raising flour, and adding in some cocoa powder to make it chocolatey and rich. The layers bake up soft, moist and sturdy enough to build a tall cake without collapsing, exactly what you want for a drip cake.
- Butter – unsalted butter or baking spread at room temperature is the best way to go for the perfect fluffy sponge
- Sugar – for most of my sponge recipes I use light brown sugar but you can use caster, golden caster or dark brown sugar
- Eggs – 8x medium eggs roughly translate as 400g of egg weight, most of my recipes run on medium eggs unless specially stated otherwise
- Flour – self-raising flour will provide the rise needed for three beautiful tiers of delicious sponge
- Cocoa powder – I replace 75g of flour with cocoa powder to give that rich delicious chocolate flavour throughout the sponge as well as the buttercream frosting
- Baking powder – an optional extra to provide a lighter texture to the sponge, many have said they don’t like adding the extra as it is already in the flour, I will leave that choice to you.
- Milk – If you’re mixture is slightly thicker than desired you can use whole milk to gradually loosen the mixture, use one tbsp at a time!
I know three-layer cakes often look a bit intimidating, but they truly aren’t any more difficult than two layers. They just LOOK ten times more impressive, the wow factor alone makes all the effort worth it and the taste matches the presentation perfectly.
Oreo buttercream
For the frosting, I stuck with the same Oreo buttercream recipe I use for my Oreo cupcakes because it’s simply perfect, fluffy, sweet, creamy, and packed with Oreo biscuit flavour. I used 300g of butter and 650g of icing sugar, then blitzed an entire pack of Oreos into a fine crumb and mixed them in. It makes enough to fill the layers, coat the outside, pipe on top, and still have a little leftover to sneak spoonfuls of.
The texture is dreamy. There’s something about adding the crushed biscuits that makes it so easy to smooth around the cake, I honestly don’t know why, but I’m not questioning it. This will boost the presentation of your cake from standard to spectacular, a smooth coating of Oreo buttercream really will look like an expensive showstopper by the time you’re finished.
The drip
I tried a new method of doing the drip on this cake, by using oil. I’ve seen people having a few problems making the ganache drip as ganache can be quite temperamental, so after reading up on the oil method I had to try it.
You only use between 1-2tbsp of oil for this amount of chocolatey, and you can’t detect it once its added. It just makes the chocolate runnier, and easier to use, whilst keep its shine. You can just use melted chocolate, but often this can be harder to use as its thicker, and it well set very solid. I’m surprised I didn’t eat some of it myself, but I resisted to make sure it look better.
If you wanted to use a ganache however you can, simply use 150g of dark chocolate and 150g of double cream! (Read about the ganache drip here… Caramac Cake)
Decoration
Once the drip had set slightly, I piped little swirls of Oreo buttercream around the top and added whole Oreos for decoration. A sprinkle of crushed Oreos finishes it off, because when you think you’ve added enough Oreos… always add a few more.
This cake is bold, chocolatey, and cookies-and-cream heaven. It’s fun to make, fun to decorate, and an absolute delight to present. I adored every minute of making this one, and the finished result brought so many smiles. I hope you love it as much as my dad’s colleagues did!
Two tier versions
I get asked all the time on my blog and social media if this cake can be made smaller, perfect for a more intimate family celebration or birthday. The good news? Absolutely! With a few simple tweaks, you can create a slightly smaller Oreo cake that’s just as delicious and impressive.
For a smaller version, I recommend using two 8″cake tins. You can adjust the ingredients as follows:
- 300g butter
- 300g sugar
- 245g flour
- 55g cocoa powder
- 1.5 tsp baking powder
- 6 medium eggs
- 3 tbsp milk
Baking time may increase slightly, around 5–10 minutes longer, depending on your oven and tin. For the decoration, you can use roughly two-thirds of the original buttercream and toppings, which still makes for a gorgeous, indulgent cake.
This scaled-down version is perfect for smaller gatherings and still delivers all the Oreo, chocolate, and cookies-and-cream goodness of the full-sized drip cake. It’s a flexible recipe that adapts beautifully for any celebration
Tips & tricks
- You obviously don’t have to make straight edged buttercream if you don’t want to, but I just like the look of it. You can slather it on, and it’ll still taste damn delicious.
- However, if you do want to make it like this, I seriously recommend using a metal scraper for the decoration of the buttercream, and the disposable piping bags.. I wouldn’t be anywhere without them.
- All of the decorations are completely optional , but I love this style of cake.
- This cake will last in an airtight container for 3 days.
Oreo Drip Cake!
Ingredients
Cake Ingredients
- 400 g unsalted butter/baking spread
- 400 g light brown sugar
- 400 g eggs (roughly 8 medium)
- 325 g self raising flour
- 75 g cocoa powder
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 4 tbsp whole milk
Oreo Buttercream Frosting
- 300 g unsalted butter (room temp - not baking spread)
- 650 g icing sugar
- 154 g Oreos (1 pack)
- 2-5 tbsps whole milk
Decoration
- 175 g dark chocolate
- 1-2 tbsps vegetable/sunflower oil
- Oreos
- crushed Oreos
Instructions
For the Cake!
- Heat the oven to 180ºc/160ºc fan and line three 20cm/8inch cake tins with baking parchment – leave to the side.
- In a stand mixer, beat together the butter and light brown sugar until light and fluffy. Add in the flour, cocoa powder, beaten eggs, baking powder and beat again briefly till combined – try not to over beat the mixture! If its really thick, mix in the whole milk to loosen.
- Divide the mixture between the three tins and smooth it over – bake for 25-30 minutes until a skewer comes out clean when poked, and when the cake springs back.
- Once baked, leave the cake to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, and then remove and leave to cool fully on a wire rack. If the cake has domed slightly, leave the cake to cool upside down to flatten it slightly.
For the Decoration!
- In a stand mixer, beat the room temperature butter with an electric mixer until it is smooth and loose and then beat in the icing sugar 1/3 at a time until its fully combined. Keep beating the buttercream for a few minutes so it starts to get fluffier and lighter.
- In a food processor, blitz the packet of Oreo’s to a fine crumb, and add into the buttercream. Beat the buttercream again till smooth, and use the Milk to loosen it to a smooth consistency.
- Once the cakes are cooled, put the first layer on the serving plate spread some of the buttercream onto the top of the first layer, add the second cake on top, and then top again with some of buttercream and then add the final sponge layer. Only use about 2 tbsps of buttercream per layer so that you have enough to decorate with!
- With the leftover buttercream, as you can see, I covered the sides (and top) too! Do a first layer of around the edge and top using a large metal scraper and refrigerate for 10 minutes. Repeat again with a slightly thicker layer of buttercream.
- I slather it on all over using an off -set spatula, and then run the metal scraper round until its smooth. If the Oreo’s were blitzed to a really fine crumb like you need, the buttercream can still be smooth around the edges even though there is biscuit in the mix!
- Once finished, melt the dark chocolate in a heat proof bowl until melted. Add in 1tbsp of oil and beat till smooth, continue to add oil till you get to a drippy consistency. I used 1+1/2 tbsps total. Using disposable piping bags, pipe it round the edge of the cake, edging over slight bits to create the drip.
- You don’t need to use too much per drip as it’ll drop quite far down by itself! Fill in the top in with the rest of the chocolate so the top is also covered. Refrigerate the cake for about 15 minutes.
- Using some left over buttercream, pipe little rosettes of buttercream onto the top and add a whole oreo – sprinkle on some crushed oreos and huzzah! You’re done! Enjoy!
Notes
- You obviously don’t have to make straight edged buttercream if you don’t want to, but I just like the look of it! You can slather it on, and it’ll still taste damn delicious.
- However, if you do want to make it like this, I seriously recommend using a metal scraper for the decoration of the buttercream, and the disposable piping bags.. I wouldn’t be anywhere without them!
- All of the decorations are completely optional – but I love this style of cake! To make a smaller version of the cake, use:
- Two 8″cake tins
- 300g butter
- 300g sugar
- 245g flour
- 55g cocoa powder
- 1.5tsps baking powder
- 6 medium eggs
- 3 tbsps of milk
- And it might take an extra 5-10 minutes to bake and use 2/3 of the decoration recipes!
- This cake will last in an airtight container for 3 days!
Hi I am so excited to try this bake but I too was going to do a Vanilla sponge instead of chocolate. I read that i need to add the flour up to 400g but do I also need to swap the light brown sugar to normal caster sugar, or do i keep the light brown sugar?
You can have whichever sugar you wish, caster sugar is more classic vanilla, light brown sugar makes a more moist/caramel like sponge x
What is icing sugar? I am trying to get the ingredients today to make but I’ve never heard this term before.
Icing sugar is a extremely finely powdered sugar that you make buttercreams and frostings with – its whatever your equivalent is where you live x
Hi. This cake looks amazing! I’d love to make it for my partner’s birthday! Do you think there is anyway I’d be able to make it a caramel Oreo cake? Or even if I could add Oreos to your caramel drip cake? My partner really loves caramel and Oreos and I wanted to make it really special but I’m worried it will get too sweet.
Hey! I would say that would be quite sweet, but still tasty! You could definitely either add caramel to this for the drip or add Oreos into the other one!
Hi Jane, do you think I’d be able to replace the Oreo with kinder bueno? Or do you think this wouldn’t work in the buttercream? X
Personally I wouldn’t, as its a complete different type of biscuit/chocolate. Have a look at my Kinder Bueno Cupcakes for inspiration for the buttercream, as that uses the Kinder Chocolate bars. x
Are you able to do this cake with a vanilla cake base instead of using cocoa powder?
If do what would I substitute the cocoa powder for?
Thanks
Leave out the cocoa powder, and up the flour to 400g.
Thank you, would crushed oreos work well in the cake batter it’s self?
if do would I have to substitute anything Thanks
They could do! You could maybe reduce the cake mixture to 350g of everything and 7 medium eggs, and then add in a packet of oreos? x
Hi Jane, I’ve made this cake before for my dads 60th and it was brilliant, thank you. I want to make it again for my sisters birthday however I was thinking of swapping Oreo for kinder bueno (her fav), do you think this would work? Look forward to hearing from you x
Seriously yumm!!! Made this for my sons first birthday and was a winner with everyone!
Ahh amazing!! I’m so glad!! x
Can I use white chocolate with oil for the drip instead of dark choc? Thanks!
I wouldn’t advise it as it’ll be too thin – its probably best to just use the white chocolate on its own x
Hi Jane ,
This cake is currently in the oven but the mixture looked very almost mousse like in consistency before it went in have I done something horrible ?
It’s very hard to say as I can’t see it.. but as it’s just a basic chocolate sponge there is no reason it shouldn’t work if you used the correct ingredients and mixed it properly!
Hi. I am making this as a 16th birthday cake and will be delivering the day before the birthday. I am worried about the Oreo’s going soft. Have you ever dipped/ brushed half of the biscuits in chocolate (the part that will sit in buttercream)? Wondering if this might prevent them going soft. Any thoughts please?
Hiya! Yes they do go a bit soft, but I usually just roll with it. You probably could to be honest! It might delay it a bit further, but they’d probably go soft eventually anyway due to being out of the packet. But, dipping half in chocolate might just make it more delicious so go ahead!
Hi Jane! I am planning to bake this cake this week, but I will be using a 7″ deep PME tin, how long would you advise to bake the mixture for?
I’m afraid I don’t know – I always bake this in three layers, and in 8″ tins. I would advise to bake it at 140C, and if you’re baking it all at once, it’ll take probably 1.5hours+
I would like to make it for 30 people but I can’t make it too tall what should I do.
Make it in larger tins?
Hi Jane.
Do you think this cake would be nice as a Victoria sponge cake, rather than a chocolate cake? Want to make this for my husbands birthday, and he prefers a Victoria sponge. Thanks.
Yep that would work well!!
Hi! I’m excited to try this out. I’m making it for a birthday tomorrow. Lots of people will be there so I’m really nervous about getting it right. Lol. Just a quick question, is it possible for me to bake the cake and leave it in an air tight container and decorate it the next day? I won’t have enough time to do it in one day.
Yeah that would be fine! I often don’t have time to do it in one day so decorate the next x
Oh my word! I made this cake at the weekend and wow! It is amazing, birthday mostly I impress myself being able to make it! Thankyou Jane! I’m going to try your lemon and blueberry cake at the weekend. It will be ok with Stork won’t it? My daughter loves cakes but unfortunately, recently has developed a dairy allergy 😞.
Sorry didn’t mean birthday! Meant to type ‘but’ 😂
Hiya! Yeah it will be fine with stork! The buttercream will be a lot smoother already though so won’t need anything added to it! x
I made your salted caramel drip cake for my daughter’s birthday, it was amazing and much admired! Many thanks! Am making the Oreo cake for my bro in law tomorrow and wondered if I could add some caramel condensed milk to the icing as I loved that flavour or would it change the colour of the butter cream.
Tricia
You could add some caramel to the buttercream but it might make it slightly more golden!
Thank you! I may add it to the filling!
The Oreo cake was a great success, many thanks! My bro-in-law loved it as did everyone at the party. I managed to get a gold cake topper and tall gold candles. It looked superb.
I currently have my sponges in the oven at the minute, im making this cake for my sister in laws birthday! Im so excited! Just worried about doing the drip as i want it too look as good as yours lol and ive not done it before so dont want the chocolate to look as if ive just poured it on haha. Love your recipes by the way.
Hey Jane,
How do you transport the cake to your dad’s office? Didnt the frosting get melted during the journey? And how do I keep the cake fresh and moist during the transport?
Hiya! No, if you use a cake box transporting will be fine.
Hi!! I was wondering what chocolate would be the best to use for the drip decoration?! Also how can you prevent the cake from crumbling into the Oreo frosting when smoothing it over?? Thank you so much, this is the 2nd time making it and was very pleased with the outcome last year and it’s a perfect recipe!! xx
Try a crumb coat first – use a small amount of the buttercream to go round the cake and keep all the crumbs in, wait 30 minutes, and then do the decoration again. This should keep the crumbs in! x