Snickers Cake is a gluten free chocolate cake topped with gooey caramel, peanuts and creamy peanut butter frosting for the perfect snickers copycat cake.
Snickers has always been one of my favorite candy bars. I would hunt for those in the Halloween treat basket, hoping to find a few that I could stash away for a rainy day.
I love the gooey caramel, chopped peanuts and nougat all wrapped in melted chocolate. It just always makes for one of the best candy bars.
This time though, I wanted to take all of those classic flavors, and bake them into a healthy chocolate snickers cake.
The results were pretty incredible, and I think you’re going to love this one just as much as my co-workers did!
How to make Snickers Cake
The Chocolate Cake
A couple weeks ago I shared the simplest, most moist {sorry if you hate that word} gluten free chocolate cake with you.
Well, today that is the base for our snickers cake.
It’s incredibly tender, and made with healthy ingredients that will have you feeling just fine indulging in a large slice of this cake, over a full-size Snickers candy bar.
Head over to that blog post {once you finish reading this one of course} to find out exactly what makes this cake so healthy and will have you saying, “this can’t possibly be gluten free.”
The Caramel Filling
Yes, even the caramel filling is healthy when it comes to this Snickers copycat recipe.
It’s actually an older recipe I made awhile back, but just couldn’t resist using it for this cake.
I mean, why reinvent the wheel, when there’s a perfectly good, healthy, blender caramel sauce that can be used to top this cake?
With just a few simple ingredients, you too can be on your way to a healthy caramel sauce you’re going to want to eat by the spoonful.
But try not to do so. We need it to cover our gluten free chocolate cake.
Snickers Cake Assembly
Once the cake is partially baked, and you have your caramel sauce ready to go, it’s time to assemble this cake.
The cake will still be warm, and not fully cooked when you spread that salty sweet caramel over the top.
Start from the edges and spread to the middle so that it doesn’t cave in the center. It’s totally fine if it does {that’s what mine did the first time around}.
Then top with chopped peanuts, and place back in the oven.
The caramel will slightly bake into the cake, making it even more delicious than it already is. I also love that the peanuts get nice and roasty toasty, giving them a little extra flavor.
The Peanut Butter Frosting
Now this is where this cake gets reaalll good.
Spreading a thick layer of peanut butter frosting over the top of this snickers cake is an absolute must.
Made with lite cream cheese, natural peanut butter and pure maple syrup, it’s ultra creamy.
It spreads like a dream over the top of chocolate cake, caramel and peanuts.
You could definitely drizzle the top of the cake with melted chocolate if you’d like. But this cake was so over the top already, I just added some chopped mini Snickers to scream to everyone that this is a Snickers cake.
One Bite to Heaven
Seriously, you only need one bite of this Snickers cake to know that you’re in heaven.
I mean, you definitely won’t be able to take just one bite, and you’ll be surprised at how fast you finish a slice. But that thick layer of peanut butter frosting paired with salted caramel and crunchy peanuts, and super tender chocolate cake will definitely have you taking more than one bite.
Looking for more copycat recipes? Check these out:
Healthy Snickers Ice Cream Bar
Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Copycat Larabars
- 1 ½ cups measure for measure Gluten Free flour
- ¾ cup cocoa powder
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- ½ tsp. salt
- ½ cup olive oil
- ½ cup full fat coconut milk room temperature
- ½ cup pure maple syrup
- ⅔ cup coconut sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- ½ cup peanuts chopped
- 10 pitted medjool dates roughly chopped
- ½ cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
- 2 tsp. coconut oil
- 2 tsp. pure maple syrup
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- ½ tsp. salt
- 8 oz cream cheese softened
- 1 cup natural peanut butter
- ¾ cup pure maple syrup
-
Preheat oven to 350°F and grease a 9” x 13” pan with baking spray.
-
In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.
-
In a medium bowl, whisk together the oil, coconut milk, maple syrup, coconut sugar, eggs and vanilla.
-
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir to combine.
-
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and spread in an even layer. Bake for 20 minutes and remove {leave the oven on}.
-
Meanwhile, place all the caramel filling ingredients in a blender or food processor, and blend until smooth.*
-
Spread the caramel sauce over the top of the warm cake, starting from the outside edges in.**
-
Sprinkle the chopped peanuts over the top, and place back in the oven. Continue baking for 10 additional minutes, until cake is set in the center. Remove and let cool.
-
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, beat the cream cheese until smooth. Add the peanut butter and beat until combined.
-
Beat in the pure maple syrup, until smooth.
-
Spread the frosting in an even layer over the cooled cake. Top with chopped Snickers, if desired.
*Note: follow complete instructions from the healthy caramel sauce post.
**Note: it’s best to spread from the outside in, so that the cake doesn’t cave in the center.
