Toffee Pecan Bundt Cake
This moist and tender Toffee Pecan Bundt Cake has a soft, fine crumb and wonderful flavor!
Servings: 15
Ingredients
- 1 ½ sticks (170g) unsalted butter, softened Should be just soft enough that it dents when pressed.
- 3 large eggs, room temperature (to warm quickly — put into a bowl with very warm water for 10 minutes.)
- 1 cup (200g) white sugar
- 1 cup (217g) light brown sugar (packed into measuring cup)
- 3 cups (342g) cake flour (if you do not have a scale, spoon into a measuring cup and level off with back of a knife) See NOTE below for cake flour substitute
- 1 Tablespoon (12g) baking powder
- ½ teaspoon (3g) salt
- 1 cup (242g) sour cream
- 2 teaspoons (8g) vanilla extract
- ½ cup (121g) milk (we used whole milk)
- ⅓ cup (68g) vegetable oil (we prefer canola oil)
- ½ cup (72g) toffee bits (we used Heath Bits O' Brickle toffee bits)
- ½ cup (49g) chopped pecans
Ingredients for Caramel Sauce
- ½ stick (57g) unsalted butter (if using salted butter, do not add additional salt)
- 1 cup (217g) light brown sugar (packed into measuring cup)
- ½ cup (126g) heavy cream
- ½ teaspoon (2g) salt
- 1 teaspoon (4g) vanilla extract
- 1 Tablespoon (18g) light corn syrup
Instructions
For the Cake
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour bundt pan or tube pan. (See Notes for additional pan details)
- 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, mixing 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.
- With the mixer on low, add the dry ingredients alternately with the wet ingredients, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. (We did three additions of the dry ingredients, alternating with two additions of wet.) Stop & scrape down sides of bowl with rubber spatula as needed (once or twice).Mix just until combined.
- 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.
- Scoop batter into the prepared bundt pan. Smooth the top with the back of a spoon. Bake for 45-50 minutes (adjust time as needed). The cake is done when a toothpick inserted into the center pulls out clean or with just a few crumbs attached. Let the cake cool in the pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes before turning out.
- This recipe makes about 8 cups of batter
Caramel Sauce
- Using a medium size sauce pan (deep enough to prevent boil over) melt the butter over medium heat.
- Add the brown sugar and the remaining ingredients.
- Stir to blend, try to keep mixture off the sides of the pan. Once the mixture begins to boil, reduce the heat to low.
- Simmer for 5 to 6 minutes, check the pot making sure it will not boil over.
- Keep in mind that the caramel with thicken up a bit as it cools. You can pour it into a long glass casserole dish if you want it to cool more quickly.
- Makes 1 cup caramel sauce. It can be kept in the refrigerator in an airtight container up to 2 weeks.
Decorating the Cake
- Once the cake has cooled, and the caramel has cooled enough to thicken to desired amount, you can spoon the glaze over the cake or pipe it with a piping bag. A piping bag gives a bit more control- we simply snipped the end away to create a small hole in the bag. You can do the same with a ziplock bag and snip away one corner.
- Top with toffee bits, crushed pecans, or both. (Ours is topped with toffee bits).
Notes
Substitution for cake flour: For each cup of flour in the recipe, measure out 1 cup all purpose flour (plain in the UK) remove 2 Tablespoons of the all purpose flour and replace with 2 Tablespoons cornstarch (cornflour in the UK). This recipe has 3 cups of flour so measure 3 cups of all purpose flour, remove 6 Tablespoons and replace with 6 Tablespoons cornstarch. Whisk to blend.
Bundt Cake Pan: Our bundt pan has a baking capacity of 12 cups, and measures 10 inches across.
If you are using a different size pan, the baking times may vary. If using a smaller pan, the general rule of thumb is not to fill the pan more than ⅔ full.