Toffee Pecan Caramel Cake with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
This Toffee Pecan Caramel Cake with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting is every bit as delicious as it sounds. It has become an instant family favorite!
With fall just around the corner, we are already dreaming of all of the wonderful flavors that come with the season, from pumpkin cake to spice cake, sweet potato cake, and more.
Today's fall cake is a delicious twist on our favorite caramel cake, incorporating toffee bits and pecans for a wonderful crunch.
Our Caramel Cream Cheese frosting is the perfect complement to this flavorful layer cake, and we love how easy it is to make!
It has all of the tangy deliciousness that we love in a cream cheese frosting, but the addition of caramel sauce takes it to a new level.
I would definitely file this recipe under our fall favorites, although caramel lovers are going to request it year round. It's just that good! We hope that you enjoy it!
Table of Contents
How to make Toffee Pecan Caramel Cake
You can find the full, printable Toffee Cake recipe at the bottom of this post. Here is a quick look at our steps!
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees, if using dark colored pans reduce heat to 325 degrees. Grease and flour three 8x2 inch round pans.
- In a separate bowl combine the cake flour, baking powder and salt. Whisk at least 30 seconds to blend. Set aside.
- In another bowl combine the sour cream, vanilla, oil and milk. Stir and set aside.
- In the bowl of your mixer, add the butter and beat on low to medium speed until smooth. Slowly add the white and brown sugar beating on medium speed until the mixture is lighter in color and fluffy, approximately 3 to 5 minutes ( a bit longer if using a hand mixer).
- Add the eggs one at a time, mixing after each egg until the yellow of the yolk is blended in.
- Add the dry ingredients alternately with the wet ingredients, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Scraping the bowl at least twice.
- Once the batter is mixed, using a spatula fold in the toffee bits and the chopped pecans. The cake batter is thick, this will help to keep the nuts and toffee bits from sinking to the bottom of the pan.
- Pour batter into 3 prepared cake pans and bake for 22 to 25 minutes. The cakes are done when a toothpick inserted into the center pulls out clean or with just a few crumbs attached. Let the cakes cool 5 to 10 minutes then turn out.
Assembling the Toffee Pecan Caramel Cake
Once the cake layers have completely cooled and caramel cream cheese frosting is prepared, it is time to assemble the cake!
First, place the bottom layer of cake onto the cake base or cake pedestal and glaze with a thin layer of caramel. (We used store bought but you could also use homemade if you prefer!)
It is best not to take it close, but not all the way to the edge.
Follow with a layer of Caramel Cream Cheese frosting.
Repeat the steps for the second layer. Then, top with with the third toffee cake layer.
Fill in any gaps between the cake layers with frosting. Apply a thin "crumb coat" of frosting on top and around the sides fo the cake. This thinly applied layer of frosting traps the crumbs.
At this point, I like to chill the crumb coated toffee cake in the freezer for 15 minutes (or in the refrigerator for a bit longer) to firm everything up for the second layer of frosting. This keeps the layers from shifting as you work.
Decorating the Cake
Finally, we frosted the chilled, crumb coated cake with a layer of our caramel cream cheese frosting, and decorated the top with a spiral of caramel applied using a piping bag with the tip snipped away.
My border is a mixture of crushed pecans and toffee bits, and the top piping was created with a french piping tip and more pecans!
We love the look of this cake, but even more, the flavor is SO good! We hope that you enjoy it.
Recipe FAQs
More Fall Cakes
In addition to our Toffee Pecan Bundt Cake, which is based on today's layer cake recipe, we have several more cakes that are perfect for fall celebrations, from fall birthdays to the Thanksgiving dessert table!
You just cannot go wrong with any of these cakes. A few of our most popular are our Carrot Cake Recipe, Maple Pound Cake, Pumpkin Spice Cake, and Sweet Potato Cake.
*Don't miss our full roundup of favorite fall cake recipe and cake decorating ideas: Favorite Cake Design and Recipe Ideas for Fall!
Thanks so much for stopping by! We hope that you enjoy this Toffee Pecan Cake.
Make sure to scroll through our collection of favorite scratch cake recipes as well as the best cake mix recipes! You can find them all in our Cake Recipes section.
We also have a great collection of free cake decorating tutorials! In this section you will find basics like How to Make a Cake, elegant cakes, baby shower cakes, and birthday cake ideas!
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Toffee Pecan Caramel Cake with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients
For the Cake
- 1 ½ sticks unsalted butter, softened (170g) Butter should hold its shape but dent when pressed.
- 3 large eggs, room temperature (to warm quickly — put into a bowl with very warm water for 5-10 minutes.)
- 1 cup 200g white sugar (200g)
- 1 cup light brown sugar (packed into measuring cup) (217g)
- 3 cups cake flour (342g)(If you do not have a scale, spoon into a measuring cup and level off with back of a knife) See Notes below for substitution if needed.
- 1 Tablespoon baking powder (12g)
- ½ teaspoon salt (3g)
- 1 cup sour cream (242g)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract (8g)
- ½ cup whole milk ( we used whole milk) (121g)
- ¼ cup vegetable oil (canola oil) (54g)
- ½ cup toffee bits ( we used Heath Bits O' Brickle toffee bits) (72g)
- ½ cup chopped pecans (49g)
For the Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
- 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened (226g total)
- 8 oz package full fat cream cheese, softened (226g)
- ½ teaspoon 3g salt
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract (8g)
- 6 cups powdered sugar (½ cup more if needed) (690g)
- 3 Tablespoons caramel sauce ( we used Smucker's Caramel Topping) (42g)
For Decoration/Decorative Accents on Cake
- Optional: Additional crushed pecans and toffee bits for border and whole pecans for accents on top.
Instructions
For the Cake Layers
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees, if using dark colored pans reduce heat to 325 degrees. Grease and flour three 8x2 inch round pans.
- In a separate bowl combine the cake flour, baking powder and salt. Whisk at least 30 seconds to blend. Set aside.
- In another bowl combine the sour cream, vanilla, oil and milk. Stir and set aside.
- In the bowl of your mixer, add the butter and beat on low to medium speed until smooth. Slowly add the white and brown sugar beating on MEDIUM speed until the mixture is lighter in color and fluffy, approximately 3 to 5 minutes ( a bit longer if using a hand mixer).
- Add the eggs one at a time, mixing after each egg until the yellow of the yolk is blended in.
- Add the dry ingredients alternately with the wet ingredients, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Scraping the bowl at least twice.
- Once the batter is mixed, using a spatula fold in the toffee bits and the chopped pecans. The cake batter is thick, this will help to keep the nuts and toffee bits from sinking to the bottom of the pan.
- Pour batter into 3 prepared cake pans and bake for 22 to 25 minutes. The cakes are done when a toothpick inserted into the center pulls out clean or with just a few crumbs attached. Let the cakes cool 5 to 10 minutes then turn out.
- Makes 8 cups of batter
- Works well for cupcakes - bake cupcakes at 350 degrees for 18 to 20 minutes
For the Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
- In the bowl of your mixer, add the softened butter and cream cheese, mix until smooth. Do not mix above medium speed.
- Slowly add the powdered sugar along with the caramel topping, salt and vanilla. Mix until the mixture is creamy and smooth.
- Don't over mix or it may become too soft. If it does become too soft, refrigerate for 10 minutes or so to firm it up to a consistency you like. If you plan to do any piping, you may need to chill the piping bag occasionally, as warm hands soften the frosting.
To Assemble the Cake
- Place the first cake layer onto your cake base or pedestal. Spread a thin layer of caramel. Follow with the Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting. Add the other layer and repeat. Top with the last layer and frost the cake as desired .
- *We used additional crushed pecans mixed with toffee bits to press around the base of the cake. We also piped a spiral of caramel on top using a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away. We used a french piping tip for the decorative stars around the top, and used pecan halves for additional decoration.
I made this cake for my Mum's bday today. I halved the recipe. Cake looks good. We haven't tasted it yet but I am sure it will be yummy. The ingredients were just too much to resist making this cake. Thank you for this.
Thanks for trying the recipe, I hope you will enjoy it.
I made this cake for my mum's bday today. It came out really well. Thanks for this awesome recipe ????
Wow!! It looks divine, thanks so much for posting a photo!
Hi everybody!! Just I am making this cake for my husband birthday tomorrow, so far is looking good, later I will show you all how I did.
I will be making this cake for my daughter’s birthday next week. My question is I have regular thick Carmel, how do I turn it into a sauce for this recipe?
Thank you for the recipe! I made the cake a week before servicing it and froze the cakes as you suggested. The cake was moist and delicious, it made a fabulous Thanksgiving dessert last night!! 🇨🇦
Hi Caroline! I'm so glad to hear it. Your cake looks fabulous!
how long do you bake if using half recipe and in 6 inch pans ? please
Ok so this is my first ever scratch cake that I'm baking for Thanksgiving for my family, I didn't have enough batter to fill pans all the way up to the top of them, am I supposed to fill it right full or leave a bit of space for it to rise? Also, I used darker pans and reduced heat for the first two layers (only have 2 8x2 pans) and I felt like the 22-25 mins was not nearly long enough. I ended up having it in the oven for almost 50 mins. The third layer I upped the temp to 350° and in for the 22 mins and had to add another 15 mins. I know it wasn't my oven because it's only a year old and I made the batter exactly what the recipe calls for, so that's weird. I do have them currently in the freezer, how long does it normally take to defrost, I'm planning on frosting tomorrow? Also do I need to shave off a thin layer before adding the caramel and frosting between the layers? I did get a little taste and it was amazing so I'm super excited to see how it turns out and how everyone will enjoy it. Thank you so much for the recipe my 8 month pregnant self couldn't resist making it!!!
Hi Kynesha, I'm sorry that we didn't see your comment sooner. It's strange about the bake time, unless by chance the oven wasn't preheated in advance? As a general rule, you wouldn't want to fill your pans more than 2/3 full.
I'm glad that it sounds like they baked up for you (even if it took some extra time!). When we freeze our cake layers, we usually allow them to sit on the counter for about 30-45 minutes before unwrapping- and then assemble it (often the layers are partially frozen when we assemble as they are less fragile that way). I would still allow another 2-3 hours for the cake to warm to room temperature.
I hope that you all enjoyed the cake, and congrats on your little one on the way! ;0)
This cake is so perfect. So beautiful. Definitely up there with one of the best cakes I have ever made. We all absolutely loved it! My husband loves caramel so this cake for made for him upon his return from a business trip. My 11 year old daughter decorated it with the icing (which was so yum!) and some caramel and some toffee bits then sprayed some gold shimmer all over. It was soooo perfect and just damn delicious! Thank you so much!
Sometimes people would say oh the icing makes the cake but in this case everything was 100% amazing.
Hi Sofy! Thanks so much for your review. We really appreciate it- So glad that you all enjoyed the cake!! xo
Well, if this cake tastes as good as it looks, my family will be very happy! Made this cake for my son's birthday! We will be cutting into it later today, but it looks spectacular! Thank you so much for sharing this recipe!
Hi Rhonda, Your cake is perfectly beautiful, thank you for posting your photo!!