Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cake
I’ve turned one of our favorite cereals into a cake, and we can’t stop stealing bites from the fridge! Layers of Cinnamon-Toast-Crunch-Infused cinnamon cake, a Cinnamon Toast Crunch crumble, Cinnamon Toast Crunch Buttercream, and plenty of cereal on top and the sides to bring it home. I crammed as much of the cereal flavor into everything that I could, and the result was an instant hit at our house.
Anyone else a total cereal addict? *Guilty*
We used to buy cereal every week at our house on our usual Friday grocery day. The cereal we’d bring home wouldn’t last even a couple days before we were scraping the bottom of the box for the last little bit of crumbs. We have a problem, I know, haha. It’s mostly me just absent mindedly grabbing yet another bowl of cereal to eat while we watch another episode of Suits (we’re in the last season!).
So we stopped buying it every week, and reserve it for special occasions like birthdays, holidays, lots in the summer, etc. However, when I saw the double box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch at Costco, I knew the Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cake on my cake bucket list needed to happen asap. It was fate!
With this specific flavor, I’ve actually already made Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cupcakes with Maple for my upcoming cookbook – and those will ROCK YOUR WORLD! For this cake, we keep the flavors throughout, and I’ll make you wait for that maple addition (it’s to die for, really). The cake, crust, and buttercream all have cinnamon. I was going to do a cinnamon drip with cinnamon chips, but decided to skip the drip on this one (the drip is my favorite, but hey, we’ll all survive, I promise).
I originally wanted to either make a powder out of the cereal and add it to my white cake recipe, or maybe even skip that altogether and go with just adding that cinnamon flavor with well, just cinnamon. But I wanted to try infusing the cake layers with that classic cereal taste – and the trick was adding it to my buttermilk. It worked like a charm. I crushed an entire cup of Cinnamon Toast Crunch into little crumbles, let it sit in my buttermilk for almost 30 minutes. The result was like that last little bit of milk you have in your bowl at the end of eating your cereal (only sour because, buttermilk). I added a bit of cinnamon, and that was it! Everything else is my normal white cake recipe.
For the crumble on the inside, I used crushed up cereal and butter – the result was just a like a lovely pie crust. I bake my cake batter right onto the crust (no pre-bake is necessary). It helps them stay together, not turn into something that’s far to hard to cut into, but still keeps that crust-like texture.
Lastly, let me tell you about this AMAZING buttercream!!!!! Holy smokes, it’s the hero of the cake. The trick to getting that signature Cinnamon Toast Crunch flavor into your buttercream, is by using a smoothie blender, and pulsing the cereal so fine that it turns into a powder (no larger chunks at all). Add that to my usual vanilla buttercream, and you have a match made in heaven! So, so easy, and my little boy’s eyes lit up when they first tasted it. My husband would NOT stop eating it out of the bowl, haha. The result of all these fun cake components is a cinnamoney, crunchy, soft, and sweet bite of Cinnamon Toast Crunch heaven – sure enough to satisfy even your most hard-core cereal lovers.
To get that swirl effect on top of the cake, I used a Wilton 1M piping tip in a moving circle motion, then just added a ton of crumbled cereal, and whole pieces on top.
Here’s a timelapse video of the process (notice I added cereal to the bottom of the cake while decorating – I decided after that I wasn’t a fan. They didn’t stay stuck on the cake because of that layer of cereal powder already in place).
VIDEO:
I fed the slices to my cake class that evening and they were so nice – they gobbled the slices up super fast! Hope you enjoy my Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cake, and happy baking!
If you make my Cinnamon Toast Crunch cake, I’d love to see it! Tag me on IG @Bakingwithblondie, or #bakingwithblondie.
- 3 Cups Cinnamon Toast Crunch
- 4 Tablespoons Melted Butter
- .
- 1 Cup Buttermilk
- 1 Cup Crushed Cinnamon Toast Crunch
- 1 Tablespoon Mexican Vanilla
- 4 egg whites
- 1 Tablespoon cinnamon
- 2/3 Cup Sour Cream
- 1/3 Cup Vegetable Oil
- 1 Box Duncan Hines White Cake Mix
- .
- 2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, slightly cold
- 2 Cups Cinnamon Toast Crunch, pulsed into a very fine powder
- 1 Tablespoon Mexican Vanilla
- 1 pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup Heavy Cream
- 5-6 Cups Powdered Sugar, Sifted
- For the Cake: Prep cake rounds with a swipe of shortening and dust of flour. Set aside.
- In a liquid measuring cup, let the cereal and buttermilk soak for about 20-30 minutes. Strain out the liquid with a fine mesh sieve, and collect the buttermilk to equal about 3/4 cup of cinnamon buttermilk. Set aside.
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.
- For the crumble, pulse the cereal in a food processor until a fine crumble forms. Add in melted butter, and pulse a couple more times.
- Split the crumble between the three cake rounds, then, using the bottom of a drinking glass, spread the crumble flat and press to stick. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the cinnamon toast crunch buttermilk, sour cream, vanilla, cinnamon, egg whites, and vegetable oil until thoroughly combined. Sift in the cake mix and stir until just combined. Don’t over-mix.
- Divide evenly between the crust-prepped cake layers, spread in an even layer, then place in the preheated oven for 25-27 minutes.
- Remove cake layers from the oven and place on a wire rack to cool for about 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, flip cakes out of their pans on a wire rack and let cool to room temperature. Wrap in plastic wrap twice gently, then freeze until ready to frost (at least 30 minutes – cold cakes are easier to frost).
- For the Buttercream: In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, add in butter and place on medium speed for about 30 seconds until the butter is light and fluffy.
- Add in Cinnamon Toast Crunch Powder, vanilla extract, pinch of salt, and heavy cream, and mix on medium speed until combined.
- Slowly add in powdered sugar about ½ cup at a time with the mixer on low speed until it’s fully incorporated.
- Flip the speed on high for about a minute to add volume to the buttercream, add in more heavy cream for thinning if needed, or another ½ cup of powdered sugar to thicken as needed. Place mixer on low speed for about 15 seconds to knock out any air bubbles.
- Assembly:
- On a cake turntable, add on a cardboard cake round the side of your cake taped to one size bigger (6” round taped to a 8” round, for example).
- Add a little bit of the Cinnamon Toast Crunch buttercream in the center of the cardboard round to act as “glue” for that bottom cake layer. Place the first cake layer down, add on a layer of buttercream.
- Place the second cake layer on top. Repeat step 2 again for the next buttercream layer, and then add on the top cake round.
- Crumb coat the entire cake, then place in the freezer for 10 minutes.
- Coat with the final frosting layer, add on additional Cinnamon Toast Crunch powder to the bottom sides, then pipe on the border, and add on cereal topping, if desired.
Oh my. I can’t wait to try this one. It is gorgeous and Cinnamon Toast Crunch is one of my favorite cereals. 2 quick questions – 6″ cake pans? and do you measure your powdered sugar and then sift, or sift, then measure? I am really looking forward to your cookbook. All your cakes are just beautiful. Also, have you seen the Malt O Meal S’mores cereal? So good – at least dry which is the way I’ve been eating it.
Hi Annette! You will LOVE this one if CTC is your fav! Yes, 3x 6″ cake pans. I sift, then measure, for the powdered sugar. OH man! I haven’t seen the s’mores kind yet – I must find it! Sounds delicious.
Is the melted butter for the crumble unsalted butter?
Hi Amanda! Yes – melted for sure. 🙂
How big are the cake pans?
Hi Heather! These are 6″ cake pans.
Thank you.
No problem, Heather. 🙂
This sounds amazing! My husband is a huge cereal fan and I’m going to try to make this for him as a surprise!
2 questions:
1. What size cake rounds do you use for this?
2. (Not cake related) What widget or setting do you use for your main picture/slide show on your main page? I am looking to have the same thing on my blog 🙂
Love your stuff!
Hi Lisa! Thank you! I used 6″ cake rounds for this cake (and most of my cakes, actually!). The “responsive slider” above is from the Foodie Pro Theme for WordPress. 😉
Hi Mandy! I noticed that there are different measurements for the cereal noted on the recipe (ex. 3 cups of cereal, 1 cup crushed cereal, 2 cups pulsed). Is the 3 cups for #2 noted on the instructions, 1 cup crushed for #4 , & 2 cups pulsed for #10?
Hi Karen! The recipe plug in I’m using isn’t letting me keep the different recipes separated (crumble, cake, frosting). The 3 cups are for the crumble, the 1 cup crushed is for the cake, and the 2 cups at the end are for the buttercream.
How’s much do you put in buttermilk to soak??
Hi Hillary! It should say in the recipe 🙂
Hi, I am not quite able to make sense of this either. It says to put the cereal with the milk but there is no other cereal measurements mentioned than what you just clarified. 3c for crymble. 1c for cake. Do you mean 1c for the cake as in the buttermilk soak?
Thanks! Trying it tonight
Hi Keri! Yes, 1 C for the soak. 3 C for the crumble.
Could you make this recipe into cupcakes easily?
Erin, absolutely. Change the baking time to 15-17 min!
Hi, I am so excited to try this! Can I use regular vanilla? Will it taste different? Thank you
Hi Wendi! Regular vanilla will work fine – but don’t use the fake vanilla imitation extract stuff. The better the vanilla, the more that buttercream is going to sing!
Where could I get Mexican vanilla? Easy to find?
Thanks!
-Marla
Hi Marla! I’ve found mine at Harmons, Amazon, and have had friends bring some back from Mexico.
Looks amazing! If I make the cake ahead of time, will the crumble stay crunchy if the assembled cake is kept in the fridge for about 48 hours before serving?
Hi Megan! The cereal gets a little soft when stored next to or on the buttercream. The inside crumble on the cake should stay crumbly because it was baked right into the cake layers.
Do you think I could bake this in two 9″ round cake pans? How would you adjust the baking time?
Hi Lindsay! Yes – it may need a few more minutes baking time – but 2 9″ pans should do fine.
I’m going to try to make this cake this weekend. My question is how do you get your cake layers thick? Mind are never that thick and I always use fresh baking soda and baking powder. 🤷🏻♀️
Hi Elizabeth! I can’t wait for you to make this cake! The cake mix and room temperature ingredients really work well together and rise super high. I love it!
Hi what bench scrapper are you using? The glass one and also what is the technique used to when you put the class on top on the cake? Thank you!
Hi Aarika! I use the Ateco scraper and Cake Safe Acrylic Discs.
Hi! I was thinking of using this frosting to pipe detailed sugar cookies but am concerned about if the addition of the powdered cereal would make smaller detailed piping difficult? I would love to know your thoughts. Thank you!
Hi Holly – If you’re going to pipe smaller details with this buttercream, I recommend pulsing the cereal to a fine powder (just like powdered sugar consistency) so you don’t have any cereal pieces get stick in the piping tip.
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