One Saturday morning, I awoke to the smell of butter pecan layer cake being made. Clearly, Bruce gets up earlier than I do, and makes very good use of his time.
In this recipe, you will find that toasting the pecans in butter, really brings out the nutty flavor. Allowing the nuts to cool and then mixing them into the butter cream frosting takes the cake to a whole new level of deliciousness. Because the butter pecan layer cake has pecans inside and out, you get the true taste of pecans. Bruce uses deep cake pans to make this cake, but if you have standard size, this will not only make a 3 layer cake, but also make about a dozen cupcakes!
Servings: 36 servings
Ingredients
Ingredients for butter pecans:
- 4 cups chopped pecans
- 1 ½ cups plus 6 Tbls butter
Ingredients for the Butter Pecan Cake:
- 3 cups sugar
- 6 eggs
- 3 ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- 4 ½ cups flour
- 3 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¾ teaspoon salt
- 1 1/2 cups butter milk
- Ingredients for Buttercream Frosting:
- 3 cups butter softened
- 8 cups powdered sugar
- 3 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1-2 tbls heavy cream
- 1 cup butter pecans this is part of the 4 cups from above
- 26 whole pecans for decoration optional
Instructions
Instructions butter pecans:
- Place chopped pecans and 6 tbls butter onto a rimmed baking sheet. Bake at 350° for 8 minutes. Stir nuts every 2 minutes until golden brown add time if needed.
- Remove from sheet pan and allow to cool.
Instructions for Butter Pecan Cake:
- Cream sugar and remaining butter until light and fluffy, 5-7 minutes.
- In a separate bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
- Add eggs, 1 at a time until just combined. Stir in vanilla. Alternately add the flour mixture and the buttermilk, starting and finishing with the flour. Stir in 2 cups of toasted pecans.
- Pour batter into 3 greased 9-inch round baking pans. Pour balance of batter into cupcake pan lined with cupcake liners. Bake at 350° for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes and remove from the pans. Allow to completely cool on wire racks. Note if you have extra batter, you can make cupcakes.
Instructions for Buttercream Frosting:
- For frosting, cream butter until white and fluffy 6-7 minutes using a stand or hand mixer.
- Slowly mix in powder sugar two cups at a time, mixing until smooth.
- Add vanilla. Mix in heavy cream until desired consistency is reached. Stir in 1 1/3 cups toasted pecans.
- Spread frosting between layers and over top and sides of cake. Decorate with remaining pecans.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
