caramel cake stacked on another piece, with a fork taking a bite

caramel cake recipe with caramel icing on parchment paper

Have yous ever made a Caramel Cake with Caramel Icing recipe? It's a classic Southern care for! But instead of a layer cake, I made it into a thin canvas cake. Less time baking, more time eating, I say! It'southward actually like shooting fish in a barrel to put together. Originally posted August ane, 2018.

caramel cake sliced into squares

The other day I walked into the kitchen to notice my 1-yr-old baby Valentine continuing on a chair by the kitchen counter, eating an entire stick of BUTTER. Such are the risks of softening butter on the counter in this house.

little girl eating butter supposed to have been used in caramel cake recipe
little girl with butter showing how to back caramel cake

I snapped this picture literally minutes afterward I had finished giving her a bathroom to clean upwardly her adventures in the toilet. She rewarded me with butter hair. These kids! It'southward a good thing she's so cute.

fork cutting into caramel icing

Caramel Cake…sheet cake?

I've been a fiddling obsessed with sheet block lately. I posted the recipe for The Only Texas Canvass Block You'll Ever Need just a few weeks ago, later testing it 3 times. And and so I moved direct into the caramel version. (Side note, do you pronounce it car-mel, or care-uh-mel? I grew up saying car-mel, only in the past few years for some reason switched to care-uh-mel, and now I feel like a pretentious food snob every time I say information technology. The truth comes out!!)

Thick caramel frosting spread over a slice of caramel cake

Southern Caramel Cake wannabe

What I really wanted was Caramel Cake, the Southern kind with layers, but without all the fuss of actual, well, layers. The cake part of a traditional Southern Caramel Block is not really caramel-flavored; it'due south a yellow or white cake that's there to soak upwardly all the caramel icing goodness. The cake office of today's recipe, though, actually tastes caramel-y because we're using 2 cups of brown sugar. And we're throwing it into a canvas pan to broil and then that information technology's done in 20 minutes!

Caramel Cake Ingredients

Here is everything you need. And so easy!

  • Salted butter
  • Brown sugar
  • Vanilla
  • Flour
  • Evaporated milk
  • Salt
  • Blistering soda
  • Sour cream
  • Large eggs
caramel cake recipe close up of cake squares

How To Make Caramel Cake

This block recipe is soooo simple. Kind of the opposite of real Caramel Block, ha. Here's a basic overview and I'll give you some more than details and photos below!

  1. Melt butter and water in a pot, add together a heck ton of brown saccharide, then vanilla.
  2. Add together flour, salt, and baking soda.
  3. Whisk together the eggs and sour cream separately then add to the batter.
  4. Bake 20 minutes! That's it!
Close up of pieces of caking showing thick caramel icing

What size pan should I utilise to bake caramel sheet block?

I similar this cake all-time in an 18×13 inch half sail pan (thinner cake means a higher frosting ratio!) but yous've got options for sheet cake. Be sure to adjust the bake time according to the pan size you select. Cooking times will always vary because anybody'southward oven is different.

How To Make Caramel Frosting

And now for the icing. Legit, from scratch, cascade-straight-up-dry-sugar-into-a-pan caramel icing takes like an 60 minutes to brand, stirring a pot the whole time. Noooo cheers. I'1000 all about the brown sugar shortcuts. Bless yous, brownish saccharide. Hither'southward a quick overview!

  1. Boil together butter, brown saccharide, and evaporated milk for 10 minutes.
  2. Add together vanilla
  3. Place the pan of frosting in an ice bath for about 5 minutes to help it thicken.
  4. Spread over the cake and devour! Brand certain you don't eat it all with a spoon outset!!
Bubbling pot of butter and brown sugar for caramel icing

(This is what your caramel should look like when it'due south boiling. It should have thickened by the end of ten minutes.)

caramel frosting recipe in a pot, cooling after boiling

Ice bathroom time. You tin see how beautifully thick it is now.

You yet go that deep caramel flavor by boiling it on the stove with some butter and evaporated milk, and it only takes a few minutes. Much easier than the dry sugar method.

Subsequently boiling, you cool for several minutes in an water ice bath to thicken it up. I LOVE this method for cooked frosting, and apply information technology in several recipes, including Nana's Famous Fudge Brownies and this Peach Cake with Brown Sugar Frosting. Information technology makes the frosting thicken up so squeamish and smooth. I consume it by the spoonful! (It's much meliorate than fistfuls of butter.)

Thick southern caramel frosting flowing from a pot onto a sheet cake

Is there a difference between icing and frosting?

Frosting is thick plenty to exist spreadable. It stays soft on the edges. Imagine the frosting on your favorite Chocolate Cake. Swirly soft for days.

Icing is thin enough to be drizzled on top of a cake, and usually hardens on the edges (like today'south caramel frosting!) It will await crackly when you cutting into information technology, like the icing on this Glazed Lemon Staff of life. Today'due south caramel frosting is kind of like a frosting-icing hybrid.

Squares of cake covered in thick frosting made from this caramel frosting recipe

How To Store Caramel Cake

Store this cake covered on the counter! If yous leave information technology in the pan you baked it in and don't have a lid for that pan, it's going to dry out pretty fast, fifty-fifty if y'all cover with plastic wrap. I like to transfer it to a big rectangular food storage container. Keep it only in i layer if yous need the frosting to stay nice for presentation. It also freezes beautifully, if well sealed.

How Long Does Carmel Cake Last?

First you should ask yourself, am I REALLY going to have any leftovers? And and then you should probably pop the block in the freezer, if past some play a joke on of fate the cake has already been out a few days. Frozen cake is proficient for up to 3 months.

A knife cutting a frosted caramel cake recipe into squares

Look at this you guys. Can you run across how this literally looks like I'k slicing up a foursquare of soft caramel? It really is caramel, with the added bonus of cake underneath it! It's then incredibly rich, and and then proficient. A piffling bit goes a long mode. (For some people who are not me.) This block feeds a oversupply and would be a cracking dessert to bring for game twenty-four hours!

More canvass cakes that y'all will dice and go to heaven for!

Facebook | Pinterest | Instagram

Caramel Cake with Caramel Icing

Servings: twenty

Prep Fourth dimension: 15 mins

Melt Time: 17 mins

Total Time: 32 mins

Have you always had Caramel Cake with Caramel Icing? It's a archetype Southern treat! But instead of a layer block, I fabricated this into a thin canvas block. Less time blistering, more time eating, I say! It's really easy to put together.

For the block

  • 1 loving cup salted butter, (ii sticks)
  • 1 cup water
  • 2 cups chocolate-brown carbohydrate
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla
  • ii cups flour, spooned and leveled
  • i/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 cup sour cream
  • two large eggs

For the icing

  • 3/4 cup salted butter, (1 and ane/2 sticks)
  • 3 & 1/two cups brownish sugar
  • 1/2 cup plus 1/3 cup evaporated milk OR heavy foam
  • one/4 teaspoon common salt
  • 1 & 1/two teaspoons vanilla

  • Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Line an 18×thirteen inch half canvas pan* with parchment paper, or merely spray it well with nonstick spray (or grease with butter).

  • In a medium bucket, cook 1 cup butter and 1 cup water over medium high estrus. Add 2 cups chocolate-brown saccharide and stir occasionally until it comes to a rolling boil (that means bubbles all the way beyond the acme, not just the edges.)  Remove from heat once information technology has come to a full boil.

  • Allow it cool for a couple minutes, then add ii teaspoons vanilla.

  • Add 2 cups flour to the pot, simply don't mix yet. Add together the salt and baking soda on top of the flour and use a small spoon to stir it into the flour (You don't want to accidentally become a chunk of common salt or soda in your cake, ew).

  • Use a whisk to stir the flour mixture in. Try to get all the lumps out.

  • In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs and sour cream. Add this to the cake batter and stir until incorporated.

  • Pour the block batter into the prepared pan and spread to the edges.

  • Broil at 350 for about 17-20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with no batter on information technology. The edges of the block will get-go to pull away from the side of the pan.

  • Allow the cake cool for about xx minutes before frosting.

  • Make the caramel icing: In a clean saucepan, melt iii/4 cup butter, 3 and ane/2 cups brown saccharide, one/2 cup + 1/3 cup evaporated milk (or heavy cream), and one/4 teaspoon salt. Bring it to a eddy over medium heat. Once it is at a rolling eddy, ready a timer for x minutes, stirring occasionally. The caramel should be a bit thicker past the end of 10 minutes, and should coat the back of a spoon. Remove from rut. Add 1 and 1/two teaspoons vanilla and stir.

  • Fill a large bowl with ice water. Place the unabridged pan of frosting into the water ice bath, making certain you don't get whatever h2o in the caramel. Let information technology sit for about 5 minutes, stirring the edges of the pan every minute. See photos. Go on an heart on it to make sure it doesn't harden upward without y'all noticing! (Don't walk away. You tin read in the comments about a bunch of people who waited besides long and their caramel got too difficult. Sometimes it takes 5 minutes, sometimes more than like 8.)

  • Stir the frosting with a wooden spoon and make sure it is thickening upward nicely. While it is nonetheless pour-able, Pour the icing over the slightly cooled cake and spread to the edges.

  • Let the icing prepare for a few minutes earlier serving warm. This is actually proficient with vanilla ice cream! It's so rich, you can cut it into pretty small-scale pieces. (I hateful. I don't. But I take a major sweetness tooth.)

*I like this cake best in an eighteen×13 inch pan (makes for a thinner cake) but here are the times for other size pans:

If you lot are baking this in a 9×13 inch cake pan, bake for 23-25 minutes. If you do a 15×10 jelly roll pan, broil for about 20 minutes. If you bake it in an 18×thirteen half canvas pan, bake for almost 17-20 minutes.

All of these times are going to vary because anybody'due south oven is dissimilar.

Calories: 452 kcal , Carbohydrates: 70 g , Poly peptide: 3 m , Fat: 19 k , Saturated Fatty: 12 1000 , Polyunsaturated Fatty: 1 g , Monounsaturated Fat: 5 g , Trans Fat: 1 yard , Cholesterol: 67 mg , Sodium: 325 mg , Potassium: 147 mg , Fiber: 1 g , Sugar: threescore g , Vitamin A: 585 IU , Vitamin C: 1 mg , Calcium: 94 mg , Iron: 1 mg

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Calories: 452 kcal