Sweet Potato Cake with Spiced Vanilla Buttercream

Sweet Potato Cake with Spiced Vanilla Buttercream - made November 2, 2019 from The Brown Betty Cookbook by Linda Hinton Brown

I had a gift card to Crate and Barrel but there aren't any brick and mortar Crate & Barrels where I live so I had to turn to online shopping to make use of the card. It seemed like a perfect excuse to get this new Bundt pan that, once I used it to make this cake, had me deciding I need to make a lot more Bundt cakes. I love this pan. Yes, I can love inanimate objects just fine. I love this pan so much I really want the mini bundt cake version of this pan. Alas, no more gift cards so I have to stay my avaricious baking hand from clicking on the "add to cart" button. But I may never use my regular Bundt pan again.

This recipe is actually meant to be a three-layer cake frosted with cinnamon vanilla buttercream. I had wanted to bring it for my next baking meetup but was a little hesitant to bring a three-layer cake to a small gathering. I knew we wouldn't be able to finish it and I wasn't sure whether it would turn out well enough that I could easily get rid of the leftovers. So I compromised by making a half recipe and made it in my new Bundt pan to do a trial run before the meetup.

Except I didn't remember I was going to make a half recipe until after I had baked the full amount of the sweet potatoes that the recipe called for. Now, in theory, I could've just weighed half the amount of the total baked sweet potatoes and called it a day. As in, if the unbaked sweet potatoes of 24 ounces translated into 18 ounces of baked sweet potatoes, I could've just used 9 ounces of baked sweet potato. Except I decided to weigh a half amount of the original sweet potato called for. Which theoretically should've been 12 ounces (unbaked) which is what I measured out (baked). From a volume perspective, 12 ounces of baked sweet potatoes was more than half of 24 ounces of unbaked sweet potatoes.

I decided to stop overthinking it and went with 12 ounces of baked sweet potatoes while I did a half recipe of all the other ingredients. Turns out the baking gods weren't as vindictive as with the disaster chocolate cupcakes and decided to cut me a break because this cake was fantastic.

It came out of the Bundt pan cleanly and I had only sprayed it with nonstick cooking spray and didn't flour it. Not a problem with this cake. It didn't puff up too quickly and collapse but rose obligingly like any good cake should. And the texture was perfect: not too light, not too dense but just cakey-right.

It's hard to tell from the picture but it's more fluffy in person than as captured by the picture. The taste was also on point. Almost like a carrot cake without the carrots. It wasn't overly spiced and it wasn't too sweet. While sweet potato isn't an aggressively strong flavor, this offers a good flavor profile, not unlike pumpkin. If you don't like pumpkin, try this sweet potato cake. I may have to re-jigger the Thanksgiving dessert roster as this deserves a place on it.

The recipe below is the original recipe from the Brown Betty cookbook but if you don't want to make a 3-layer cake either, make a half recipe but use 12 ounces of baked sweet potato and half the amounts of everything else. For the glaze, I just did a simple glaze of confectioners' sugar, whole milk and vanilla bean paste, to taste and consistency.

1 1/2 pounds sweet potatoes, scrubbed
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
4 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/8 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
8 large eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup evaporated milk
1 recipe Spiced Vanilla Buttercream

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Coat three 9-inch round cake pans with nonstick cooking spray and line a rimmed baking sheet with foil.
2. Place the potatoes on the baking sheet and rub the skins with oil. Roast the potatoes until tender when pierced with a fork, 50 to 55 minutes. Set the potatoes aside until they are cool enough to handle. Using a knife, remove the skin of the sweet potatoes and place the flesh of the potatoes in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat the potatoes on medium-high speed to remove pulp, about 1 minute. Push the flesh through a fine-mesh strainer over a medium bowl. Set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger.
4. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy, scraping the bowl as necessary, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until blended. Add the strained sweet potatoes and vanilla; beat until blended.
5. Reduce the mixer speed to low and alternately add the flour mixture and evaporated milk to the sweet potato mixture, beginning and ending with the flour mixture and beating until smooth.
6. Divide the batter equally among the prepared pans and bake until a wooden pick inserted into the center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Let the cakes cool in the pans for 10 minutes before turning them out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
7. To assemble and frost the cakes: place 1 cake layer, bottom-side up, on a cake plate. Use an offset spatula to spread 1 cup of the buttercream on top, Add the second cake layer, bottom-side down, and spread 1 cup of the buttercream on top. Top with the third cake layer, bottom-side up. Frost the top and sides of the cake with the remaining buttercream.

Spiced Vanilla Buttercream
6 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature
pinch of salt
14 ounces (1 3/4 cups) confectioners sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese and vanilla together on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the butter and salt; beat until blended, scraping the bowl as necessary.
2. Reduce the mixer speed to low and gradually add the confectioners' sugar, beating until blended. Scrape the bowl and add the cinnamon. Increase the mixer speed to high and beat until light and fluffy, about 1 minute. Set aside until ready to use.