Gingerbread Dump Cake

Dump Cake is kind of an unfortunate name, but what it’s trying to illustrate is that all you have to do to make it is dump a bunch of ingredients into a baking dish and then voila… cake! (You do have to put it in the oven. So it’s not completely magic.) So I think we can all agree that, while the name may be, the easy process itself is in no way unfortunate. And this version in particular is a warming spiced gingerbread dream.

Okay, you do have to do a tiny bit of mixing, but you can do it right in the baking pan if you want. And it’s just to prevent having whole cooked eggs in your cake, so it’s well worth it.

You mix together some eggs, applesauce, evaporated milk, and sugar and pour it into your baking dish.

And then you sprinkle the gingerbread cake mix over the top. (Now, if you can’t find gingerbread mix, you can use a spice mix. If you can’t find a spice mix, you can add your own spices to a yellow or white cake mix and the end result is still great. The quantities you’ll need are in the recipe notes below.)

Some chopped pecans and cubed butter get layered on next…

… and then it heads into the oven, where the butter melts down into the layers below and the cake mix settles into the buttery liquid and it creates a sweetly spiced layered cake that’s ooey-gooier than your standard one.

Gingerbread Dump Cake

1 hour 15 minutes to prepare serves 12

Ingredients

  • 2 cups applesauce
  • 1 (12 oz) can evaporated milk
  • 3 large eggs
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 (14.5 oz) package gingerbread cake mix (see Notes)
  • 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cubed
  • 1 cup pecans, chopped
  • Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream, for serving

Preparation

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F and grease a 9x13-inch baking dish with butter or nonstick spray.
  2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the apple sauce, evaporated milk, eggs, and sugar until combined. Pour mixture into prepared baking dish.
  3. Sprinkle dry cake mix evenly over applesauce mixture. Top evenly with chopped nuts and cubed butter.
  4. Bake until almost set in the center, 55-60 minutes. Let cool at least 30 minutes before serving. Enjoy!
  5. Note: If you cannot find gingerbread cake mix, you can use yellow or white cake mix and add 1 teaspoon allspice, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1 teaspoon ground ginger, 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves, 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg, and a pinch of black pepper to it.