Topped with cinnamon cream cheese frosting and candied pecans and baked with fall spices, sweet potato cake is the perfect fall dessert. This six inch cake is part of my collection of small cake recipes.

What can you do with sweet potatoes? Make a sweet potato cake! Most people roast sweet potatoes as a side dish or make sweet potato fries but you can actually turn your sweet potatoes into dessert too.

You may already be familiar with sweet potato casserole, a creamy soft mash topped with mini marshmallows. It’s often served as a Thanksgiving side dish but let’s face it, it’s kind of a dessert. 

How about a sweet potato cake instead? Just like pumpkin puree does for pumpkin cakes, sweet potatoes make this cake extra moist. 

Why I Like This Cake

Like my favorite carrot cake recipe, this sweet potato cake is another one of my six inch cakes. I find it to be the perfect size for a small family, as a part of a sampling in a dessert buffet or even a potluck with multiple dessert offerings. 

This cake recipe uses whole roasted sweet potatoes. I love using fresh ingredients and they can be roasted ahead of time.  I roasted two large sweet potatoes in the oven and then peeled and mashed them up with a hand blender. 

I’ve also added cinnamon, cardamom and nutmeg to the cake batter to add some extra flavor. These warm spices are especially enjoyed during the fall season!

This sweet potato cake is paired with a cinnamon cream cheese frosting and garnished with chopped candied pecans. 

Ingredients Needed For Sweet Potato Cake

• All Purpose Flour
• Baking powder
• Spices: ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg, ground cardamom, salt. This is where all the flavor comes from!
• Unsalted butter: Make sure it's melted and cooled.
• Vegetable oil: Keeps the cake moist.
• Sugar: I've use a combination of granulated sugar and light-brown sugar.
• Sweet potato puree: You will need about 2-3 roasted sweet potatoes to get enough puree.
• Eggs: Make sure they are room temperature for best mixing.
• Vanilla Extract: Always use pure vanilla extract for best flavor.

How to Make Sweet Potato Cake

Start by preheating your oven to 350°F and preparing two 6-inch cake pans. Butter the pans, line them with parchment paper, and dust them lightly with flour to ensure the cakes release easily after baking.

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, and salt. This step ensures even distribution of the spices and leavening agents, creating a perfectly balanced cake base. Set the dry ingredients aside while you work on the wet mixture.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter, oil, vanilla extract, and both sugars until the mixture becomes light and fluffy. Be sure to break up any clumps of brown sugar for a smooth texture.

Next, add the egg and sweet potato puree, mixing just until everything is incorporated. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, being careful not to overmix. Finish by folding in the remaining flour with a spatula to maintain a tender crumb.

Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cake pans, smoothing the tops for even baking. Place the pans in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Once baked, let the cakes cool in their pans for about 5 minutes before turning them out onto wire racks to cool completely. When the layers are fully cooled, frost them with your favorite topping, or try my cinnamon cream cheese frosting for a delicious finish.

Substitutions For This Recipe

• If you decide to serve it for a larger gathering, you can double the recipe and use 8 inch pans.
• You can keep it as a two layer cake rather than splitting the two layers to make four.
• You can also choose to use canned sweet potato puree instead of roasting whole sweet potatoes. 
• Feel free to adjust the amounts of or even change the spices in the cake. Ginger powder or ground cloves would work well with the flavor.
• Cinnamon tastes divine but other frostings to consider would be a marshmallow frosting or maple frosting.
• To keep it nut free, you can also decorate it with mini marshmallows or drizzle it with a salted caramel sauce.