This red velvet Christmas Poke Cake is a fun and easy chocolate holiday cake filled with white chocolate cream and topped with a thick layer of creamy cream cheese frosting. The red color combined with crisp white frosting and added Christmas sprinkles make a perfect dessert.
Poke cakes are popular because they are easy cake recipes with an ingredient seeping into the cake through the holes you poke in the top of the cake. While many of the old-fashioned poke cakes use jell-o, other recipes have added pudding or cream into the cake to create a moist and delicious dessert.
You can’t go wrong with making this sweet dessert this Christmas season. It’s an easy recipe that you can get the kids to help with and bring to a holiday party, pot luck, or holiday dessert table.
Christmas Poke Cake
Red velvet cake is just a chocolate cake with red food coloring. It’s perfect to use for the holidays.
If you’re new to the poke cake world, get ready to be obsessed. You’re going to find out that making poke cakes are addictive and fun. (and delicious!)
You’ll find that this red velvet poke cake is full of flavor and is super moist. There won’t be a dry piece of cake in the pan! This colorful cake is really easy with just a few simple ingredients including a box mix as the base.
This Christmas jello poke cake is literally perfect to take to the next family gathering and will have everyone digging in so that they don’t miss a piece!
Another poke cake we love is our strawberry poke cake garnished with fresh strawberries.
Ingredients
- 1 box Red Velvet Cake mix
- 1 14 oz can of sweetened condensed milk
- 1 cup white chocolate chips, melted
- 1 serving cream cheese icing, can or homemade
- 1/4 cup Christmas sprinkles
- 2 tablespoons white chocolate curls
Instructions
- Prepare the red velvet cake mix according to the package and bake cake in a 9×13 pan.
- Place the white chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl and microwave in 30 second intervals until completely melted. 3. Once the chocolate is completely melted, combine with the condensed milk stirring until completely combined and smooth.
- Next is the fun part (great to let kids help with this part) once the cake was cooled, poke holes in rows (about 1-2 inch intervals) with the handle of a wooden spoon.
- Pour the sweetened condensed milk mixture over the whole cake and push gently into the holes.
- Place cake in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes to set.
- After the cake chills for 30 minutes, top with cream cheese frosting and return to the refrigerator until ready to serve.
Suggestions and Alternatives
- Change the cake mix – Since a boxed cake mix is one of the main ingredients, change out the flavoring of the cake mix to change the flavor of the poke cake. If you want to keep it a holiday cake, you can try a lime mix, or even a strawberry cake mix, too.
- Try a different flavor of frosting – I really like cream cheese frosting but you can easily try it with vanilla frosting.
- Cool Whip – many poke cakes use a simple whipped topping like Cool Whip on top instead of a heavy frosting.
- peppermint extract – add 2 teaspoons peppermint extract to make a rich chocolate peppermint cake
- colored frosting – add some green gel food coloring to the cream cheese frosting to make a red and green Christmas cake
- Valentine’s Day – use heart sprinkles and make this for Valentine’s Day
- Fork – you can alternatively use a large fork to poke small holes in the cake instead of the wooden spoon.
- cool cake – make sure the cake is cool when you pour the milk mixture on top. If you pour it on a warm cake it will absorb too quickly and make the cake fall apart.
How Do You Make the Holes in a Poke Cake?
I use the handle end of a wooden spoon to make the wholes in the cake. I think it’s a good size and it keeps them uniform as well. Be sure to space them out a bit (but not too far) so that they’re not too close to make a messy wet mess of the cake.
How Do You Store Leftover Poke Cake?
This cake is so good that it won’t last long, but if you’re lucky enough to have some leftover, you can easily store it in the fridge until you are ready for your next piece.
Due to the added ingredients, it does need to be kept cool when not being eaten. Cover the cake and it will keep for a few days in the refrigerator.
What Other Toppings Would Go Well with a Poke Cake?
Think of this like any other cake recipe! You can easily pair this up with a scoop of ice cream to really take the sweet factor up a notch.
I also like to add on some sprinkles and even top it with some extra chocolate chips as well. If I’m feeling really froggy, I’ll drizzle on some chocolate syrup as well. Because when you’re an adult, you can eat your piece of cake however you want!
- candy canes – add some peppermint flavor to this cake by crushing candy cane bits and adding them to the top like sprinkles
- sprinkles – use your favorite Christmas sprinkles on the top of the cake
Can You Make a Round Cake?
We haven’t tested this poke cake as a round cake so we can’t recommend this. The ease of this cake is making it in a 9×14 pan.
The concern with a round, stacked cake is that the cake will be too moist and collapse.
This simple poke cake recipe is going to make holiday baking so much fun. It is a simple and delicious cake that’s perfect to showcase on Christmas Eve, Christmas day, or anytime during the holiday season. It’s looks elegant and no one will know how easy it is to make.
This is a perfect dessert for the Christmas holiday, and can be made for a special occasion as well. It’s a crowd favorite no matter when you serve it.
More Poke Cake Recipes
Christmas Poke Cake
Ingredients
- 1 box Red Velvet Cake mix
- 1 1/4 cup water
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 3 eggs
- 1 14 oz can of sweetened condensed milk
- 1 cup white chocolate chips melted
- 1 serving cream cheese icing can or homemade
- 1/4 cup Christmas sprinkles
- 2 tablespoons white chocolate curls
Instructions
- Prepare the red velvet cake mix according to the package and bake in 9 x 13 pan
- Place the white chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl and microwave in 15 second intervals until completely melted.
- Once the chocolate is completely melted, combine with the condensed milk stirring until completely combined and smooth.
- Once the cake was cooled, poke holes with the handle of a wooden spoon in rows.
- Pour the sweetened condensed milk mixture over the cake and push gently into the holes.
- Place in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes to set.
- After the cake chills for 30 minutes, top with cream cheese frosting and return to the refrigerator until ready to serve.
- Before serving, top the cake with white chocolate curls and the sprinkles.
Nutrition
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Comments & Reviews
John Mills says
What is one serving of cream cheese?