My love for quick, easy and small batch desserts has inadvertently turned me into the single serve recipe queen! My Microwave Mug Cakes consistently rank amongst my most popular recipe, and I am super excited to bring you the easiest mug cake to date. It uses 1 cup, 2 ingredients and cooks in 3 minutes!
I was inspired by the Magic Ice Cream Bread trend that was doing the rounds last year, and made it for myself. To be honest, I was underwhelmed. The bread was quite stodgy and not particularly sweet, in reminded me of a scone but not in a good way.
But I felt like the concept was good, and made perfect sense. The self raising flour provided gluten and leavening, and the ice cream provided moisture, fat and sweetness. I played around with the ratio of flour to ice cream, and by increasing the liquid and lowering the dry ingredient, the end result was sweeter, richer and lighter.
My next test was whether this idea would translate to the microwave – the original Ice Cream Bread is poured into a loaf tin and baked for 40 minutes in the oven. I reduced the amount and experimented with mug size and cooking time. Before long I had nailed it – a delicious cake that could be cooked in a microwave in around 3 minutes!
As much as I love fancy ice cream, I feel like the cheaper ice cream works better in this recipe – it’s sweeter and richer than the artisan brand I tried.
And please by all means, try different ice cream flavours! This mug cake would be amazing with chocolate, salted caramel or even cookies and cream.
I also loved stirring in nuts, crumbled up cookies and choc chips into the batter. Get as crazy as you want with flavour and texture combinations!

Ingredients
- 1 cup vanilla ice cream melted (or flavour of your choice)
- 1/2 cup self raising flour
- Extra ice cream to serve
- Sprinkles to decorate optional
Instructions
- Mix the melted ice cream and flour until combined in a microwaveable mug
- Cook on medium high for 3 - 3 1/2 minutes depending on the strength of your microwave.
- You know it's done when the mixture puffs over the top of the mug and appears set in the centre. To double check, insert a skewer into the middle. If it comes out clean, the mug cake is done!
- Serve with an extra scoop of ice cream and some sprinkles, if you so desire.
- Enjoy!
14 Comments
This looks awesome! I’ll have to give this a shot once I restock on self-rising flour. I’m always looking for an alternative to making an entire cake, and this is easily the simplest microwave cake I’ve seen.
It’s pretty much the easiest cake I’ve ever made! Hope you enjoyed it Matt
[…] 2 Ingredient Ice Cream Microwave Mug Cake […]
Excited for this attempt! Suggest using regular flour or a pancake mix in replacement to self rising flour?
If you use regular flour it won’t rise, but very keen to hear how you go with the pancake mix!
Tried this, and the texture & structure came out great. However, it tasted like plain bread. Might have something to do with the ice cream flavor (which by itself is already sweet).
Hello, i have a question. What can i use instead of mug and how much time it will take?
You could use a small microwave-safe bowl such as a ramekin – try for the same amount of time and see how you go!
it came out as hard as a stone, even my hamsters had given up chewing on it. how can this recipe work??? tried three times and three stones came out.
Oh no!! Sounds like they were overcooked, I would suggest lowering your microwave setting and time
Super easy to make for someone lazy like me! At first, I didn’t believe one bit it was going to work since the recipe just looked too easy- and nothing ever works for me. When I took it out of the microwave I was shocked! It actually worked. It didn’t rise as much as I thought it would, but it for sure worked. Next time when I’m making this, I’ll try using more baking power for the self-rising flour to see if that helps.
So glad you enjoyed it Makayla!
It was so good but i added sugar is it ok
If you feel like it needed more sugar, then by all means!