10 Canned Secret Ingredients For Cake That Will Impress Everyone

As a cookbook author and recipe tester, I've tested and baked a lot of cakes in my life. While I'm all for the classics, there's something satisfying about taking a cake everyone has tried at some point and adding canned ingredients to make cake magic. So, if you're ready to liven up your cake game, you probably have all sorts of affordable and easy options sitting on your pantry shelves right now.

Whether you're making a boxed cake or whipping up your favorite cake from scratch, why not mix it up with some of these canned ingredients? Your family, friends, or guests will be impressed at just how tasty your cake is and will want to know all your secrets. Of course, it's always up to you whether you share.

Pumpkin-flavored anything is a fall favorite, so it's a natural to add to a spice cake. If you're looking for easy, there's no easier than this: you can replace all the wet ingredients called for in a boxed spice cake with a 15-ounce can of pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling, which will make the cake very sweet) to make a pumpkin spice cake.

It's so easy — put them both in a bowl and fold them together, then bake according to the cake box instructions. Finish it off with a classic cream cheese frosting for the perfect expression of pumpkin spice in cake form. You can also add the pumpkin to white cake mix with a teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice for a similar flavor profile.

More into the whole PSL vibe? Add a half to a full teaspoon of espresso powder to the mix to make a pumpkin spice latte cake that'll thrill anyone who eagerly awaits Starbucks' fall drink menu. You can even add pumpkin to a scratch-made cake to replace eggs, oil, or butter: ¼ cup pumpkin puree = 1 egg, and 1 tablespoon of pumpkin = 1 tablespoon of butter or oil.

Canned cherry pie filling already has some sugar and thickener added to it, so it's perfect to use as a filling in all different flavors of cake. Chocolate cherry is the classic, of course, and it's easy to bake a chocolate layer cake and spread cherry pie filling between the layers. For a Black Forest cake, bake a layer cake and fill it with layers of hand-whipped cream and cherry pie filling, topping off with more cherry pie filling.

Another extremely delicious cake combo adds cherries and your favorite cola to chocolate cake mix to make a chocolate cherry cola dump cake. It's so easy to do: spread a 21-ounce can of cherry pie filling on the bottom of a 9x13-inch cake pan, mix a box of cake mix with a cup of cola and spread it over the cherries, and bake it in a 350°F oven for about half an hour.

Pineapple isn't necessarily a secret ingredient for people who are familiar with the tropical, caramelly goodness of pineapple upside-down cake, but you can use it in a lot of other cakes you may not have thought about before to add yummy flavor. For example, add an 8-ounce can of crushed pineapple (with juice) to a box of white cake mix along with three eggs, a half cup of oil, and up to 1 teaspoon of rum flavoring. Fold it all together, and bake according to the box instructions. Frost it with coconut frosting, and you'll have a piña colada cake that everyone will love.

You can also add an 8-ounce can of undrained crushed pineapple to spice cake along with the rum extract, 3 eggs, and a half cup of oil to make a spiced pineapple rum cake that would be fantastic with cream cheese frosting. You can even make a pineapple filling for a white cake by simmering two 8-ounce cans of undrained crushed pineapple with a half-cup of sugar and 3 tablespoons of cornstarch until it thickens, and then stir in a few tablespoons of butter. Cool it before you fill your cake.

I'm allergic to dairy, so I use coconut milk as a baking substitution a lot. I'm a fan of the thick, full-fat coconut milk because it has great coconut flavor, and you can use it as a substitute for whipped cream, which I like for topping all kinds of cakes like strawberry shortcake or angel food cake.

To use canned coconut milk to replace whipped cream, refrigerate a can of full-fat coconut milk overnight. It will separate into liquid and solid. Once it does, use a spoon to remove all the solids from the top of the can and put them in a bowl (save the liquid to be used in smoothies or baking later). Then, whip it just like you would whipped cream, adding a little sugar and vanilla for sweetness.

I also love making coconut milk frosting by using the coconut cream (the solids from the top of the can) in place of butter and whipping it with powdered sugar, vanilla, and a little of the coconut water from the can to adjust the thickness of the coconut buttercream. It's the perfect frosting for a white cake, especially when you decorate it with coconut flakes.

I'm going to start this one with a warning: make sure you're using canned beets and not pickled beets unless you want an oddly vinegary cake. But canned beets, drained of their water and pureed in a blender or food processor, make a delicious add-in to cakes that have stronger flavors. It tastes especially good with chocolate cake or with mocha cake, adding an earthy sweetness that blends beautifully.

You can add canned beets to a boxed chocolate cake mix, blending the drained beets with the liquid ingredients the cake mix calls for. Then, fold it into the chocolate cake mix, just like the box directions suggest. Bake as usual, and you'll have a moist chocolate cake with added flavor and complexity. You can also add up to 1 teaspoon of espresso powder, sifted with the dry ingredients in the cake to make a chocolate mocha cake that can't be beet.

Canned yams are going to function a lot like canned pumpkin in any cake, so you can use the spice cake hack above for a tasty sweet potato cake. You'll want to drain and puree the yams in a blender or food processor before you add them to your cake mix, making sure you get all the lumps out. They'll add moisture and an earthy sweetness that's similar to pumpkin in both flavor and texture. To add extra flavor, use a rasp-style grater to add the zest of an orange and squeeze about half of the orange into the yams as they puree.

Try this with yellow cake mix, white cake mix, or sour cream white cake mix. You can even use a half-and-half blend of pureed canned yams and sour cream for a tangy take on a yam cake. Fold in some chopped toasted pecans for crunch and flavor. Your yam cake will be delicious with a classic cream cheese frosting.

I know what you're thinking because I thought it, too! But adding canned tomato soup to a cake is actually a baking hack that's been around since long before we called anything a hack — over 100 years since the early 1920s! As strange as it sounds, it makes an odd sort of sense, given that tomatoes are actually a fruit, and condensed tomato soup doesn't have any savory ingredients like garlic or basil added.

The recipe used to show up on the back of a Campbell's Condensed Tomato Soup can, and people have been making it ever since as an heirloom recipe. Add a 10.75-ounce can to the wet ingredients for a boxed spice cake mix, reducing the water or milk called for to ¼ cup. Mix with the dry ingredients and fold in some chopped pecans and, if you enjoy them in cake, raisins. Bake according to the package instructions, and once the cake has cooled, frost with cream cheese frosting. It tastes like a spice cake, only better, without any tomato flavor. You'll be surprised, but it could just become your new favorite cake.

Canned almond filling (not almond paste) has been one of my secret baking ingredients for decades. If you love the flavor of almonds, then you need almond filling in your pantry because there's so much you can do with it. Naturally, using it as a filling for layer cakes is the most well-known use and the one I'm recommending here.

I love it between the layers of a chocolate or white cake with a simple vanilla or chocolate frosting — or get fancy and make an almond butter buttercream with almond butter, confectioner's sugar, vanilla or almond extract, and a little milk to adjust the consistency as desired. While it tastes great in a simple presentation like that, it's also fabulous when paired with berries or cherries. Spread the almond filling between the layers of the cake and then top the filling with sliced strawberries or pitted sliced cherries, put on the next layer, and frost.

Nuts are tasty in a cake or on a cake. Always chop them roughly before you add them so nobody's chomping down on a huge whole nut, either by pulsing them a few times in the food processor or roughly chopping with a chef's knife. You can use mixed nuts for a variety of flavors and textures or use a single type of nut. Some of my favorites for cakes are walnuts, pecans, hazelnuts, almonds, and cashews.

I love them for their texture folded into the batter for spice cake, chocolate cake, or carrot cake. Add about a half cup and fold them in just before baking. To top a cake, chop the nuts a little more finely and then sprinkle them over your favorite frosting as decoration and texture. I love chopped hazelnuts sprinkled on top of a classic ganache or chopped mixed nuts (instead of just pecans) in an old-fashioned German chocolate cake frosting.

If you've ever been to Cracker Barrel, then you've probably heard of Coca-Cola cake. This Southern favorite is rich and delicious and so chocolatey, and it's somehow gooey and fluffy all at the same time. Quite a feat for a chocolate cake. Most Coca-Cola cake recipes are so good that you'll wonder why you haven't been adding cola to chocolate cake all along.

Cola makes a great cake mix-in, both for the flavor it adds and the lift the fizzy liquid gives the finished cake. To add it to a cake, use it in place of water or milk at a 1:1 ratio. You can do the same with a cake mix. It tastes best with chocolate cake because the notes in the cola blend perfectly with the richness of the chocolate.

But don't think you're stuck with just using cola. Any soda will have the same lifting effect on the cake, and it'll add flavor. Some flavor combos to try: root beer or orange soda with vanilla cake (don't forget the ice cream on the side), cream soda with white or yellow cake, or lemon-lime with a lemon cake. The sky's the limit in trying different flavor combos for a truly delicious cake that'll make people want to know your secret.