Cashew Cake is made with roasted cashews and old-fashioned oats. This cake is dense, moist, and pairs evenly with reduced-fat cream cheese frosting—yum!
Try Healthy Brownies, Healthy Carrot Muffins, or this Healthy Ice Cream next!
What is a Cashew Cake?
This cake has a low amount of sugar, especially compared to cakes that use 2+ cups of sugar! It’s made without flour (using oats instead) and can be dairy-free (just skip the frosting and use plant-based butter or coconut oil).
While the cake does contain sugar, and the frosting (skippable) has some too, it’s still a solid choice nutritionally. Not reliable, but definitely a great option in moderation!
And of course, I haven’t even mentioned how satisfying it is—because first and foremost, it’s downright tasty.
What Does It Taste Like?
This Cashew Cake is truly one of the most favorite baked goods I have ever shared. It’s rich, moist, dense, sweet, and very nutty. If you love cashews and oats, you are going to go nuts for this cake! (Pun intended, haha!)
Cashew Cake Ingredients
Below are a few ingredients worth diving deeper into:
- Cashews. home cooks enjoy dry roasted and lightly salted cashews best — more flavor without any extra effort on your part. (Here’s what we use in this cake).
- Old-fashioned oats. Although it would make sense that any oats would work since they’re getting blended anyways, it’s important to use old-fashioned to ensure you get the right measurement. Both quick and steel-cut oats are smaller, denser, and more compact, so measurements would be off and the cake would end up too dry.
- Almond milk. Any milk will work in these bars; we tested them with cow’s milk and plant-based milk. The recipe is written with plant-based milk to keep these bars as nutritious as possible, but use whichever you prefer.
- Corn starch. This is an important ingredient since we aren’t using flour and need some additional support and thickness.
Quick Tip
While the ingredients in this cake are naturally gluten-free, make sure to check all your ingredient labels to ensure they weren’t processed in a facility with gluten. If you have celiac disease, the small amount of contamination that could take place is enough to cause serious problems.
How To Make Cashew Cake
This recipe is quick and simple to make, but you do need a good, powerful blender (think Blendtec® or Vitamix®) to break down the cashews, butter, and oats.
Make sure to stop the blender and thoroughly scrape down the sides to ensure everything fully integrates.
Cashew Cake Tips
- Use a light-colored 8×8-inch pan and line it with parchment paper for straightforward cake removal.
- This cashew cake does slightly cave in the middle. You’ll know it is done when it’s no longer glossy looking on top, the edges are firm and lightly browned, and a toothpick when inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
- Set cream cheese out at room temperature: We want the cream cheese to have plenty of time to soften, so start the process of making this cake by taking it out of the fridge.
- Only frost the cake once it has completely cooled– otherwise, the frosting with change textures from the heat of the cake.
Cashew Cake Recipe Storage
Frosted bars need to be tightly wrapped and stored in the fridge since there is dairy in the frosting. The fridge will turn the bars stale quickly, so they are best consumed soon after being made. (This cake is best eaten within 2-3 days.)
For unfrosted bars, store them in an airtight container at room temperature. Unfrosted bars freeze nicely, but frosted bars don’t freeze as well because of the dairy in the cream cheese frosting.
To freeze*/thaw unfrosted bars:
- Cool cake completely before storing. Slice into bars.
- To freeze: Wrap individual cake bars in plastic wrap and then place all the wrapped cake pieces in large freezer bags.
- To thaw: Set out at room temperature or heat frozen cake in the microwave.
*There is some loss of texture and flavor when freezing and thawing this cake.
Use Leftover Cashews In One Of These Recipes:
- Golden Milk with turmeric and other healing spices
- Cashew Ice Cream made without bananas or dairy!
- Add as a topping to a bowl of Microwave Oatmeal
- Carrot Smoothie a breakfast smoothie that tastes like carrot cake!
- Mango Chicken Curry with mangoes and cashews
