Pecan Pie Cake Roll
This delicious pecan pie cake is made with a layer of pecan pie filling rolled up inside of a light sponge cake. It’s the perfect make-ahead holiday dessert!
We’re all about pecan pie in my family. It wouldn’t be Thanksgiving (or Christmas!) without a southern pecan pie for dessert.
A few years ago I started making pecan pie filling without the crust and adding it to other desserts and now we have all sorts of pecan pie desserts to choose from during the holidays.
This awesome pecan pie cake is similar to a pumpkin roll. It’s soft, spongy butter pecan cake filled with pecan pie filling and rolled up into a delicious dessert that
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Ingredients You’ll Need
- Butter Pecan cake mix – This cake mix is sold in most grocery stores. If you are unable to find it you can substitute with yellow cake mix. If you do this we suggest adding 2 teaspoons of butter pecan flavoring to the cake batter.
- Eggs – Use large eggs for this recipe. They will whip up and add the light, springy texture to your cake roll which will allow it to be rolled and unrolled for filling.
- Water
- Fats – Between the cake batter and the pecan pie filling you will use two types of fat, vegetable oil and butter.
- Sugars – Between the cake batter and the pecan pie filling you will use three types of sugar powdered sugar, granulated sugar, and corn syrup.
- Pecans – We use pecan halves and finely chop them for the outside of the cake and roughly chop them for the filling to give it more crunch.
- Cream cheese frosting – You’ll use about half of a container of cream cheese frosting.
- Vanilla extract – Vanilla extract added to your pecan pie filling adds a little extra flavor.
How to Make Pecan Pie Cake Roll
This simple recipe will make 2 cake rolls. If you only need one you can wrap and freeze the second one and serve it at your next party. This is perfect if you’re making a pecan pie cake for Thanksgiving dessert and want to serve it again at Christmas!
Step 1 – Prepare the oven and pans. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line 2 jelly roll pans with parchment paper and lightly spray the parchment paper with non-stick spray. Set aside.
Step 2 – Whisk the eggs. Add the eggs to a large mixing bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer. Using an electric mixer whisk on high for approximately 6 minutes until they are fluffy and turn a light yellow color. This step adds air to the eggs which will help make a very light, fluffy cake.
Step 3 – Make batter. Add the cake mix, water, and vegetable oil to the eggs and whisk on medium for 30 seconds then use a spatula to scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl to ensure all of the dry ingredients are incorporated into the eggs. Continue to whisk for 1 more minute.
Step 4 – Bake. Divide the batter evenly between the two prepared jelly roll pans (approximately 15.75 ounces of batter each). Place the pans in the oven side-by-side and bake for 10-12 minutes or until the cake lightly bounces back after pressing in the center.
Step 5 – Roll the cake. While the cake bakes lay out two clean dish towels and lightly dust them with the powdered sugar. This keeps the cake from sticking to the towels.
When the cake has finished baking remove the pans from the oven and very carefully flip each pan over onto the kitchen towel. Peel off the parchment paper.
Starting with a short side of the cake roll the cake up in the towel. Yes the towel gets rolled up into the cake! Let the cake cool completely like that.
Step 6 – Make the filling. While the cake roll cools, make your pecan pie filling. Instructions are in the recipe but we have included lots of extra info here including how you can make your pecan pie filling ahead of time.
Step 7 – Fill the cake. When the filling is ready gently unroll the cake. Spread the filling evenly over cake leaving a little space around the edges. You will use approximately 18 ounces of filling per cake roll. Once filled gently roll the cake back up.
Step 8 – Frost. Using approximately ½ cup of cream cheese frosting per cake roll frost all sides of the cakes. After frosting the cake rolls spread coat each with 1 cup of chopped pecans. You can do this by spreading the pecans on a clean surface and rolling the cake over them, or pressing the chopped pecans on the cake rolls with your hands.
Cut the ends off the cake to give it a neat appearance and then serve cake immediately.
Looking for More Pecan Pie Recipes?
- Puff Pastry Pecan Pies
- Pecan Pie Bread Pudding
- Southern Pecan Pie
- Pecan Pie Cheesecake Brownies
- Pecan Pie Brownies
- Pecan Slab Pie
Making Pecan Pie Filling
It’s simple to make pecan pie filling. Combine all of the ingredients and bake in the oven until it is perfectly ooey gooey.
We have lots of extra tips and information in our Pecan Pie Filling recipe including how to make it ahead of time and store it until you’re ready to use!
I’ve had lots of people ask if they have to bake it and my answer is yes. This method gets the best results. I’ve tried it on the stove top and it takes just as long and you have to stand there stirring it. It’s hard to get it to a consistent temperature and often it gets overcooked and then becomes hard.
If you do it this way you can get other things done while it bakes!
What is a Jelly Roll Pan?
Jelly roll pans are baking pans that are 15 inch x 10 inch and have 1 inch sides. This raised side allows the cake to rise without overflowing from the pan.
We suggest this jelly roll pan from Chicago Metallic. It is made with heavy duty material so it doesn’t warp in the oven when baking.
Who Makes Butter Pecan Cake Mix?
Betty Crocker makes a great butter pecan cake mix. I like the added flavor it gives the cake BUT we all know flavored cake mixes come and go so if you can’t find butter pecan cake mix don’t worry, you can use a yellow cake mix plus 2 teaspoons of butter pecan flavoring instead if needed.
Where to Find Butter Pecan Flavoring
The easiest place to find butter pecan flavoring is online. Amazon sells it here but you can also look for various spice stores that can ship it to you. Michaels stores or specialty cake or baking stores in your area may also carry it.
Make It Ahead of Time
You can make a cake roll ahead of time. Just follow all of the instructions in the recipe and then, when it is done, wrap it in plastic wrap followed by a layer of aluminum foil and store it in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or in the freezer for up to 2 months.
When you are ready to serve the cake remove it from the refrigerator and let it sit out on a platter on the counter for 1 hour to come to room temperature.
If you have frozen your cake you’ll want to let it thaw for 24 hours in the refrigerator and then let it sit out at room temperature for 1 hour before serving.
How to Store It
Once baked, filled, and frosted you can let the pecan cake sit out for up to 4 hours. After that it should be stored in the refrigerator until you are ready to enjoy your leftovers. You can also freeze any leftover cake if you prefer.
Refrigerator – Wrap the cake in plastic wrap followed by a layer of aluminum foil and store it in the refrigerator for up to 3 days
Freezer – Wrap the cake in plastic wrap followed by a layer of aluminum foil and store it in the refrigerator for up to 3 days
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Pecan Pie Cake Roll
Ingredients
Cake Roll:
- 6 large eggs
- 15.25 ounce Butter Pecan cake mix, see note 1
- 1/2 cup water
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 2 cups finely chopped pecans
- 8 ounces Cream cheese frosting
Pecan Pie Filling:
- 1 cup Sugar
- 1 1/2 cups Corn syrup
- 4 large Eggs
- 1/4 cups Butter, melted
- 1 1/2 teaspoons Vanilla extract
- 2 cups Pecans, chopped
Instructions
Cake Roll:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
- Line 2 jelly roll pans with parchment paper and lightly spray the parchment paper with non-stick spray. Set aside.
- Add the eggs to a large mixing bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer. Using an electric mixer whisk on high for approximately 6 minutes until they are fluffy and turn a light yellow color.
- Add the cake mix, water, and vegetable oil to the eggs and whisk on medium for 30 seconds then use a spatula to scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl to ensure all of the dry ingredients are incorporated into the eggs. Continue to whisk for 1 more minute. (See note 2)
- Divide the batter evenly between the two prepared jelly roll pans (approximately 15.75 ounces of batter each).
- Place the pans in the oven side-by-side and bake for 10-12 minutes or until the cake lightly bounces back after pressing in the center.
- While the cake bakes lay out two clean dish towels and lightly dust them with the powdered sugar. This keeps the cake from sticking to the towels.
- When the cake has finished baking remove the pans from the oven and very carefully flip each pan over onto the kitchen towel. Peel off the parchment paper.
- Starting with a short side of the cake roll the cake up in the towel. Let the cake cool completely like that.
- While the cake roll cools, make your pecan pie filling.
- When the filling is ready gently unroll the cake. Spread the filling evenly over cake leaving a little space around the edges. You will use approximately 18 ounces of filling per cake roll.
- Once filled gently roll the cake back up.
- Using approximately ½ cup of cream cheese frosting per cake roll frost all sides of the cakes.
- After frosting the cake rolls spread coat each with 1 cup of chopped pecans. You can do this by spreading the pecans on a clean surface and rolling the cake over them, or pressing the chopped pecans on the cake rolls with your hands.
- Cut the ends off of the cake to give it a neat appearance and then serve cake immediately.
Pecan Pie Filling:
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Lightly spray a 8″x8″ (2 quart) glass baking dish OR a 9-inch pie dish with non-stick spray.
- Mix all ingredients together in a bowl and stir until they are well mixed. Then pour into your greased dish.
- Place in the preheated oven and bake for 45 minutes. Use a spoon to stir the filling every 15 minutes as it bakes.
- When the timer goes off remove the filling from the oven and let it cool for 20 minutes before using. You want the filling to have a consistency similar to a thick jam. Thick enough that it doesn’t run off of your spoon but still spreadable.
Notes
- You can substitute with yellow cake mix if you can’t find butter pecan cake mix. If you do this we suggest adding 2 teaspoons of butter pecan flavoring.
- If you are adding pecan pecan flavoring to a yellow cake mix you can add it when you add the cake mix, water, and vegetable oil.
Love this!
Thank you for sharing at the Thursday Favorite Things b log hop. Hubby will love this ( pecan pie is his holiday fav) watch for your feature tomorrow. xo
Thanks so much Katherine! My mom makes the best pecan pie and she gave it two thumbs up so I hope he likes it!
Could you cook the pie filling on the stove top, instead of baking?
I debated on doing that and in the end just went with baking because I was sure it would work but I do think you could do it on the stove top just stir, stir, stir!!
The recipe sounds yummy but my husband is a german chocolate lover. I am thinking of using the german chocolate topping (with the coconut and pecans) in the middle and then make a caramel sauce to drizzle over the top just before serving.
That sounds amazing!! let me know how it turns out.
Hi what type of sugar do I use in the sponge and filling. Cheers
Just regular old white granular sugar.
Delicious thank you
Great recope
I do not have, nor have I ever had any butter nut flavoring. I don’t want to buy it for just 1 tsp. in this one recipe. Can vanilla ext. be used as a sub? Or just omit it altogether? Am anxious to try the recipe, as pecan pie is my very favorite pie, and this looks amazing!
I do not have, nor have I ever had, butter nut flavoring. I don’t want to buy it for just 1 tsp–(yes, I’m that chea…,um, frugal). Can I sub. vanilla extr. or butter, or just omit it altogether?
No problem just use vanilla extract. I hope you like it!
I believe you left off a step in the recipe. Are we supposed to put 2c of pecans halfway through bake time of cake?
Thank you so much for catching that. You are right and I’ve made the changes to the recipe!
Would it be possible to cook this on the stove rather than bake, stirring so it doesn’t stick.
I think so! I almost did it that way but I didn’t have time to stand and stir so I just popped it in the oven. Just make sure you keep stirring the whole time so the sugar doesn’t burn. If you try it please come back and let me know if it works!
Can this be made ahead and frozen like a pumpkin roll?
Hi Sandy, I haven’t tried freezing it. I did make it a couple of days ahead of time and I stored it in the refrigerator. It was still just as good but I am not sure how the filling would react to being frozen and then thawing out. If you try it please let us know!
Such a lovely dessert and I can’t wait to try this. Could I use parchment paper instead of a kitchen towel to roll the cake up into a roll?
Yes I have read that you can use parchment paper or wax paper instead of a towel.
Can you freeze this?
Yes you could freeze this just make sure to take it out of the freezer several hours before serving to let it defrost.
If you do the filling on the stove, how long do you cook/stir, is it done at low heat?
I didn’t try it on the stove top but I do believe it would work. I would keep stirring it the whole time so it doesn’t burn on the bottom. Sugar can go from good to burnt really quickly!
Can you use a regular all purpose flour? Thanks
Yes you can!
Have you tested this with Bobs Gluten Free flour?
I haven’t but Bob’s Red Mill has a gluten free baking flour that they say can be substituted for all purpose flour 1:1. I would go for it!
This looks great! Do you think it would work to add chocolate chips to the pecan filling also?
I think that would be delicious. I’d sprinkle them in over the filling before rolling it up. If you try it let me know how it turns out!
Just made this. Your recipe didn’t mention when to add the extract, so I just added it in the batter before adding in the dry ingredients. Also, my filling took at least 1 1/2 hours in the oven before it began to firm up. Pretty excited that this was the first cake roll I’ve made that did NOT crack! Can’t wait to try it!
Thanks for letting me know about the almond extract. I’ll update the recipe. I’m glad you stuck with the filling and got it to firm up and that your cake roll didn’t crack! I hope you love it as much as my family did 🙂
I am unable to find the butter nut flavoring. If I use 1/2 tsp butter flavoring and 1/2 tsp almond would this compare?
Also when I make my pumpkin roll I always roll it up with wax paper and place in freezer for 1hr to completely cool before adding filling. Would this would with this roll as well?
You could even just use almond flavoring and vanilla. I was just trying to give it a bit of nut flavor rather than just vanilla but it really doesn’t make a huge difference (even just vanilla would be fine). I think you could do anything you usually do with a pumpkin roll! Good luck I hope you love it!
I found the Kroger’s butter & nut flavouring at a store (Ralph’s) as I ordered it thru Amazon.com (McCormick’s) and it hadn’t arrived yet????. No mention as to when to put it in so I will mix it in before I fold in the dry ingredients… I’ll post as to how it turns out…
Hi Caty, yes, add it right before folding in the dry ingredients. If it doesn’t come in time you can just use vanilla. I wanted a slightly nutty flavor but I truly don’t think it makes a huge difference and would taste just fine with regular vanilla extract.
How do you wrap this up to store in fridge ?
I just roll mine up in plastic wrap.
Greetings. This sounds and looks absolutely, mouth-wateringly delicious. But does it really take FOUR CUPS of pecans, in total? I don’t know how much pecans cost where you live, but here in southern Ontario, Canada, that’s about $30.00 in pecans. Should I ever win the lottery, this will be the dessert I make to celebrate. Until then, I will have to settle for drooling on the photos!
Goodness that is expensive! Pecans aren’t so much where we are in MD. You could make this with less pecans and it would just not have as much pecan flavor but traditionally pecan pies are lots and lots of pecans held together with a gooey filling.
Loved it when it was fresh, just don’t store it in a plastic contained once used to store onions like I did. It soaked up the flavor of onions from the plastic. Yuck.
LOL, live and learn! 🙂 So glad you liked it (before the onion part!
I would really like to know about the silver serving tray the cake is on! And the pretty glass dish the single piece is served on. Where do they come from and how can I obtain them?
Thanks so much Wendy! Both the plate and the serving platter were inherited from my guy’s mom and she’s had them forever so unfortunately I can’t tell you where to find them. Sorry about that. I hope you try our the pecan pie roll at some point. You’ll love it!
What size of jelly roll pan do I use?
15×10 inch or 17×12 inch jelly roll pans are standard and both work. My pan was 17×12
your recipe omits the 3 eggs
Hi Florence, what to do with the 3 eggs is listed under the cake instructions.
I’d love to try the pecan roll recipe. I”m not sure the size pan you use, and I”m sure it would make a big difference. Please let me know. Can’t wait to bake a test one before Thanksgiving!–Joey
It is a 10″x15″ pan.
This looks great and I plan on making it. But was wondering how it cuts?
with all those nuts is it difficult to cut nice slices or does it require some special way of slicing it so it’s not all chewed up? I have made swiss rolls with chocolate chips and they always give difficulties where the knife hits the solid chocolate, I imagine all those nuts would be the same if not worse. Any thoughts? or tips?
Good question. The pecans do sometimes fall off but I didn’t have trouble cutting mine. I used a serrated knife. You can skip the pecans on the outside if you like. It is still delicious!
I made this cake today , it seems to be very delicious . I did two variations, I put one fourth tsp of almond flavor and one fourth tsp of vanilla, instead of the butternut flavor. I figured the pecan pie filling has butter and nuts , so I thought that was enough of one thing . Sometimes I experiment , it worked out fine.
I’m so glad you liked it. I love the flavor combo of almond and vanilla. Great idea!