Southern Sweet Potato Cake Recipe
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This delicious Southern Sweet Potato Cake Recipe is perfect to serve for any occasion, or any time you’re in the mood for baking. The cake is made layers of slightly spiced sweet potato cake and a honey cinnamon buttercream for a lovely combination that has been a palate pleaser over the years, and has become one of our most popular cake recipes.
For years we’ve enjoyed dining at Brick Street Cafe. Not only do they have a lovely, eclectic atmosphere but the menu, particularly the dessert menu is fabulous. The dessert selection alone is worth a visit. It’s like a tour of the South in dessert form!
A good plan when dining at Brick Street Cafe is to have a light salad for supper to save up room for cake because the cake serving size is crazy huge. One of the cakes they are famous for is their Sweet Potato Cake. It’s a lightly spiced cake, similar to carrot cake, but made with sweet potatoes and oh so moist.
For many years I had been wanting to recreate the Southern Sweet Potato Cake, so a few years back I set out to conquer it. A few renditions later and I settled on a cake that we are delighted with. It’s a moist cake with just the right amount of spice to compliment the sweet potato.
And yes, there is real sweet potato in this cake, about 4-5 of them to be exact. Just to push this Sweet Potato Cake over the top, I then paired it with a fluffy Cinnamon Honey Buttercream Frosting. Sweet potatoes, cinnamon, and honey always make a good team, don’t they?
It’s a cake worthy of a special occasion or even just an ordinary day you’d like to make special. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we have! Happy baking, y’all!
A few Sweet Potato Cake recipe notes:
- I’ve made this cake with and without freezing the cake layers. It is delicious either way but I do think freezing the cake layers (separately) creates a lovely dense and more moist cake. To freeze cake layers, wrap cooled layers (separately) in 2 layers of plastic wrap, then insert each wrapped layer in a zip-top plastic bag. Freeze for up to 2 months. Don’t forget to label and date your cake!
- For the mashed sweet potatoes, I used my Quick Baked Potatoes method. It takes only 30 minutes! The potato halves can be easily peeled, then mashed. If you’re planning on baked potatoes for supper, bake some sweet potatoes while you’re at it to have on hand for cake making.
- Try my Cinnamon Honey Buttercream Frosting Recipe with this cake for a delectable combo.
More delicious baking recipes:
Strawberry Upside Down Cake
Chocolate Hazelnut Torte
Homemade Gingerbread Loaf
Easy Blueberry Pie
Southern Sweet Potato Cake Recipe
Southern Sweet Potato Cake Recipe
A delicious cake for any day or holiday, made with sweet potatoes, cinnamon and ginger. Topped with Honey Cinnamon Buttercream for a perfect combination.
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
- 1 tablespoon ground ginger
- 16 tablespoons (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 3 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 2 1/2 cups mashed cooked sweet potatoes, cooled (about 4-5 sweet potatoes)
- 1 cup whole buttermilk
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350-degrees F. Butter and flour two 9-inch round cake pans. Line bottoms with baking parchment and butter the top of those too.
- In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and ginger. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a mixer, beat together butter and sugar on medium-high for 4-5 minutes until creamy, stopping to scrape down bowl at least twice. Gradually add beaten eggs. Beat on medium-high for 1-2 minutes until fluffy, scraping down bowl as needed. Add vanilla and sweet potatoes and beat until smooth, scraping down bowl as needed (scraping down the bowl is important stuff, y’all).
- Add the dry ingredients into the butter mixture in thirds, alternating with buttermilk. Beat on low speed until just incorporated, scraping down bowl as needed.
- Divide batter evenly between pans. Bake at 350-degrees F for 35-45 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Allow to cool in pans for 10 minutes, then invert onto cooling rack to cool completely.
Notes
This recipe makes a 2-layer 9-inch cake.Pair this cake with Cinnamon Honey Buttercream Frosting for a delicious combination.
Originally published September 18, 2o15. Last updated July 18, 2021.
I made this in two loaf pans after an hour an 15 minutes I took them out still raw not sure what happened or why
I stumbled across your blog b/c I’m trying to make Brick Street’s Sweet Potato cake for a birthday party! I searched by sweet potato cake and was so excited to see that you’ve had Brick Street’s so I have high hopes this will be great nock off!! Thanks
This cake was amazing! Personally, I think it’s better than Brick Street Cafe’s recipe (if that’s even possible). I will definitely be making this again soon! Thanks so much for sharing your recipe.
I’m so happy to hear it, Kelly! Glad you enjoy it as much as we do.
I just made this cake and frosting and it was so great.
Howdy! Do you happen to have a weight for the 2.5 cups sweet potato (or for your flour)?
Thanks!
I don’t. Next time I make this I’ll try to measure weights.
I just asked my husband what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday, and he mentioned sweet potato cake like Brick Street’s. We now live in GA, so no swinging over to the bakery there, but so glad yours was the first recipe i came across! I’ll be trying it out this weekend. Thanks!
I hope it turned out tasty for y’all, Heather!
We especially loved the frosting. I underbaked it a bit, so center was bit gummy, but favor was delicious. My cakes rose probably half inch above the pans, so I had some crusty edges to sample before I assembled them. I’ll try it again, since I’m kind of a cake novice.
One of the things I miss most about South Carolina…..Brick Street Cafe’s sweet potato cake. Gonna try this recipe tomorrow.
This look phenomenal! So moist!
This cake was outstanding! I made it as a bundt, but I wish I’d made it as a layer cake to better appreciate the frosting. My son suggested a marshmallowy frosting, brûléed— yum!
Ooooh, what an excellent frosting idea!
Thank you very much for the lovely recipe! I made this last week and it was very moist, very cinnamon and very sugary. It worked as a cupcake as well as a pound cake. So both were so successful and my family and co-workers being the ‘sweet tooth’ people they are love it!
I am new diabetic so this time round I am going to put less sugar but I don’t know if it will turn out as good.
my question is can I make this with splenda? Will splenda ruin the natural sweetness of sweet potatoes.
I have not tried this recipe with a sugar replacement so I am not sure. Let me know if you try it and how it turns out.
One of the best cakes for special celebrations! So flavorful and delicious!
I tried this cake today, it turned just great.. the texture and taste are just perfect… Thank you for such a delicious recipe…
Wow! I have some fabulous recipes but this is now going to be the top of my list! This was one of the best cakes I’ve ever made. Thank you so much for sharing this recipe. I’ve decided you are my new best friend!! Thank you many times over! (P.S. I did use a cream cheese frosting instead of the buttercream you recommended.)
Yay! So happy to hear it, Kim!
This cake looks absolutely beautiful.. I can’t wait to bake it!
sweet potato cake is the best!
So amazing! This is a dessert I will make for my family again and again!
This cake is so amazing! I’ll take a sweet potato dessert over a pumpkin dessert any day!
Oops! I wanted to rate this recipe 5 stars, but it only showed up as 4.5!
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I live in Greenville and the Brick Street cake is always requested by my daughter for her birthday. It is pretty expensive so I thought I’d try to make one and I stumbled across your recipe. While I love buttercream and yours looks wonderful, my daughter wanted me to use the traditional cream cheese so that is the only change I made. Well everyone absolutely loved it! I decided to get a slice of the Brick Street cake to compare the two side by side. The first difference is that they use a ton of frosting – I made mine with 1 block of cream cheese, 1 stick butter, 3 cups powdered sugar plus vanilla and a pinch of salt and I probably should have doubled it (NOTE: my girls thought the frostings were very similar in flavor). There was definitely a difference in the texture of the cakes. Theirs is a lot more moist (and not necessarily in a good way). I did use your technique of putting the layers in the freezer so mine was pretty dense and moist. Theirs was lighter in texture but when you put it in your mouth it was much mushier. Yours also has a lot more flavor – my husband loved it and my daughter suggested a little less cinnamon but overall we liked the flavor of your cake better. Also, and I’m not sure if this is just because of Holly’s comment about Duncan Hines, theirs tasted like a box mix. I think my only suggestion if someone wants to push it more towards Brick Street is to figure out how to make the texture lighter and give it a “melt in your mouth” moistness. If I had to choose though – I’d take your cake! Thanks so much for the recipe.