Spice Cake Best Ever With Cream Cheese Frosting

Spice Cake

Fall is that time of year where you have more excuses to make cake right? At least that’s how I feel about it. It’s that time of year to break out all those delicious, sweet spices on a cold day and get baking! One cake I’ve been wanting to try for years is just an old fashioned spice cake. I always loved the boxed spice cake growing up but I rarely cook with them anymore so I need a good homemade version. So here we are.

So Much Better than Box Mix!

It took a few attempts and a lot of contemplating on exactly what I wanted from this cake but let me tell you this cake is worlds better then anything you get from a box! It is probably the most moist cake I’ve ever had and filled with the perfect amount of all those delicious autumn spices. It uses brown sugar instead of white sugar which gives it a sweet caramel-y note and pairs so well with the spices.

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It’s Perfect with Cream Cheese Frosting!

And of course if we are going to have cake we need to have cream cheese frosting right? I know, I’m obsessed with cream cheese frosting, but it just goes so well with this cake. The slight tanginess of the frosting balances out the sweetness of the cake. Then I chose to add nuts to the outside of the cake vs. swirling them into the batter. If I add nuts to a cake, the majority of the time I like to add them over the frosting layer. I usually like the contrast through layers not between crumbs. But if you aren’t a fan of nuts of course you can just omit them here.

Ingredients You’ll Need in This Recipe

Flour – base Baking powder, baking soda – leavening Cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, allspice, cloves – spiced flavor Brown sugar – sweetener Vegetable oil, unsweetened applesauce, buttermilk – tenderness and moisture Eggs – binding Vanilla, salt – additional flavor Pecans – textural contrast

Ingredients for the Frosting

Powdered sugar – sweetener Cream cheese, vanilla – flavor Butter – moisture

How to Make Spice Cake

Preheat oven, prepare baking pans. Whisk dry ingredients and spices. Mix brown sugar with vegetable oil and applesauce, then mix in eggs and vanilla. Mix in two additions of dry ingredients alternating with buttermilk. Pour into prepared pans and bake until set. Let cool. Prep cream cheese frosting and spread over cooled cake, sprinkle with pecans.

Now say hello to a new favorite cake! A good fall tradition, no?

Use Cake Strips if You Have Some

Not sure how, I’m still not so knowledgeable about all the science behind baking, but this cake does end up domed despite the fact that it has so much leavening, oil/applesauce and liquid. With that said, you can either use cake strips (DIY version here) to help prevent that. Or you can just do what I did and cut the extra little portion off the top and eat it, no reason to waste good cake right?

Can I Add More Spices?

If you want a well spiced cake just up the spices. I want somewhere in the middle of mild and strong because I wanted it to be a kid friendly cake too. This is one of my new favorite cakes and I’m already trying to think up another excuse to bake it again because we finished it off so quickly! I was literally scraping up the crumbs from the cake plate.

I created this cake to be much like one of my favorite kinds of cake – which is carrot cake and it is so much like it, but without the carrots and a more generous amount of spice. It’s amazing to say the least and I hope you enjoy it as much as we did! Happy Fall!