Chocolate Bibingka From Woldy Reyes
This recipe is from Woldy's upcoming book, In the Kusina, out April 8th, 2025. The recipe was originally featured in Cherry Bombe's Love Issue.
To be totally honest, I was just bored one day and got to thinking about how I could evolve bibingka or spin it in a new direction (this is what chefs do when they have too much time on their hands!). And, duh, chocolate. Chocolate makes everything better. But the lightbulb moment was when I asked myself: What if I made bibingka like a brownie?! Like a classic Betty Crocker, from-the-box mix sort of thing. So here I’ve added not one but two different chocolate elements: cocoa powder and rich, slightly bitter melted dark chocolate. Try not to swoon! By blending a classic chocolate brownie with traditional bibingka, it’s sort of like this encapsulation of me: part American, part Filipino, totally fabulous.
Photo by Fujio Emura
INGREDIENTS
Makes one 9-inch (23-centimeter) round cake
1¼ cups (170 grams) rice flour
1¼ cups (165 grams) glutinous rice flour
1 cup (200 grams) sugar
¾ cup (75 grams) cocoa powder
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
3 eggs, at room temperature
One 14-ounce (420-milliliter) can unsweetened coconut milk
1 cup (240 milliliters) sweetened condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
6 ounces (170 grams) 70% dark chocolate, roughly chopped
½ cup (110 grams) unsalted butter
Chocolate Coconut Mousse, for garnish (optional) (recipe follows)
Confectioners’ sugar, for garnish (optional)
METHOD
Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C) and position the rack in the middle of the oven. Spray a 9-by-2-inch (23-by-5-centimeter) round cake pan with nonstick olive oil cooking spray. In a large bowl, whisk together the rice flour, glutinous rice flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt. In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, coconut milk, sweetened condensed milk, and vanilla. Set aside.
In a small saucepan over medium-low heat, melt the chocolate and butter together. Gently stir until the mixture is completely smooth. Pour the chocolate mixture into the wet ingredients and whisk until incorporated and smooth. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and whisk until the batter is smooth. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake for 1 hour, or until a wooden skewer inserted into the center comes out clean.
Let the cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Remove the cake from the pan and transfer to a wire cooling rack with a baking sheet underneath. Let cool completely, then transfer the cake to a cake stand. Slice and serve with a generous scoop of chocolate mousse and a dusting of confectioners’ sugar, if desired. Wrap leftovers tightly in plastic wrap or store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
Chocolate Coconut Mousse
INGREDIENTS
Makes 4 to 6 servings
One 8-ounce (230 grams) bag semisweet chocolate chips
2 cups (455 grams) vanilla coconut yogurt, at room temperature
¼ cup (20 grams) unsweetened cocoa powder
3 tablespoons coconut jam
1 teaspoon kosher salt
METHOD
Put the chocolate chips in a heatproof bowl over a double boiler filled with simmering water. Stir the chocolate until glossy and melted. Remove the luscious melted chocolate from the heat and set aside to cool.
To a medium mixing bowl, add the yogurt. Using a rubber spatula, pour and scrape the melted chocolate into the yogurt and gently fold the chocolate in until combined. Using a small fine-mesh sieve, sift the cocoa powder into the chocolate-yogurt mixture. Fold the coconut jam and kosher salt into the mixture until fully combined and the color transforms into a rich chocolate brown. Divide the chocolate yogurt mixture among four to six serving dishes, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight. They will keep for up to 2 days.
From In the Kusina: My Seasonal Filipino Cooking by Woldy Reyes, out April 8th, 2025. Reprinted by permission of Chronicle Books.
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