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traditional southern caramel cake

(1)
NakedMaggie avatar
Recipe by
Maggie May Schill
@NakedMaggie
Jacksonville, FL

Having grown up in New England, I've never had a caramel cake before...like ever! So when I decided to try a caramel cake out I decided it should be the most traditional Southern variety as I can get. That included dense sweet sponge and thick gooey brown butter frosting. (A type of frosting I've previously not tried.) I'm still not sure if I love caramel cake or not, but boy is it sweet!

(1)
yield 16 serving(s)
prep time 45 Min
cook time 40 Min
method Bake

Ingredients For traditional southern caramel cake

  • FOR CARAMEL CAKE
  • 3 c
    cake flour
  • 1 1/2 Tbsp
    baking powder
  • 1/4 tsp
    salt
  • 1 c
    sugar
  • 1/4 c
    caramel syrup
  • 1/2 c
    unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 1 c
    whole milk
  • 3 lg
    eggs, room temperature
  • 2 Tbsp
    pure vanilla extract
  • FOR BROWN BUTTER FROSTING
  • 1 c
    unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 4 c
    confectioner's sugar
  • 1/2 c
    heavy cream, cold
  • 1 Tbsp
    pure vanilla extract
  • 1/8 tsp
    salt

How To Make traditional southern caramel cake

  • 1
    Preheat oven to 375'F Spray two 9-inch round cake pans with cooking spray, line each with a parchment paper round. Spray again over parchment rounds. Set pans aside.
  • 2
    Beat butter in a large mixing bowl. Gradually add sugar to butter mixture and continue to beat until fluffy.
  • 3
    Beat syrup into the butter mixture until completely incorporated. Add one egg at a time into batter, completely incorporating each before adding the next.
  • 4
    In another large mixing bowl, sift flour, salt, and baking powder together.
  • 5
    In a measuring cup pour out milk. Mix vanilla extract into the milk.
  • 6
    Gradually add flour mixture into butter mixture, alternating between flour and milk mixture; beginning and ending with flour mixture until both the flour and milk mixtures are complete incorporated into batter.
  • 7
    Divide batter evenly between pans and bake for about 30 minutes, or until a tooth pick comes our barely clean.
  • 8
    Cool cake for 10 minutes in pan, then turn out onto wire wrack to finish cooling.
  • 9
    For Frosting: 1- in a sauce pan over medium heat, melt butter until nutty brown. Be careful not to scorch. Immediately pour butter into a large glass mixing bowl. Let butter cool for 15-20 minutes. 2- With an electric mixer, mix in vanilla and salt. 3- Gradually add confectioner's sugar until completely incorporated. You will have a clumpy mess at this point. 4- With your mixer on low gradually at cream. Add more cream as needed to get desirable creamy frosting texture, but don't over do it, or you'll have a mess.
  • 10
    Assembly: Level off any doming on the cooled caramel cakes. Place the first cake on a cake platter and frost the top of it. Stack the second on the first and frost entire cake as desired. I chose to garnish with extra caramel syrup.
  • Last Step: Don't forget to share! Make all your friends drool by posting a picture of your finished recipe on your favorite social network. And don't forget to tag Just A Pinch and include #justapinchrecipes so we can see it too!
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