Lemon and Cherry Dump Cake + Video Recipe

Yes, this is a dump cake but this really should be called the “$5 Dollar Dump Cake”. Let me explain.

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I would like to call this cake “The $5 Dump Cake” because you really can make this cake for less than $5. Let’s me a do a cost breakdown for you. The prices of the ingredients are according to Kroger.

• Cream Cheese- $1
• Lemon Cake Mix- $1
• 2 Cans Cherry Filling- $2

this is assuming you have vanilla extract and a stick of butter at home.

 Now, these ingredients were on sale for $1 and that is the best time to get these ingredients when they are on sale. So, if you are looking for a cheap dessert to make for a crowd that they will love, this is the dessert to make. Let’s get into the development of this cake and we will talk about how great this dessert is and how you are going to fall in love with it later.

I had my first dump cake when I was in college. A friend of mine at the time got into cooking and she invited me and my roommate over for dinner. I think she made Meatloaf for dinner and I can remember this because I remember her putting rice in her meatloaf and that was the first time I ever saw that. We talked about the reasons that she put rice in her meatloaf as opposed to crackers like I was familiar with. Then for dessert, she made a Cherry Pineapple Dump Cake. I never in my life heard of Dump Cake. I asked her what that was about and she told it is a cake where you dump a bunch of stuff in a pan and place dry cake mix on top. It wasn’t the fact that the cake was mixed with two crazy flavors like cherry and pineapple. It was when she said you put dry cake mix on top of those ingredients. I was like “what?!” She mixed the dry cake mix with butter of course but it was still kind of crazy to me.

I remember taking that first bite and I made the kind of face where I was confused, but I wasn’t sure if I liked the cake, but I knew I liked the cake, and I was falling in love at the same time. Try to imagine such a face. Yea it looked sort of like that… a hot mess.  But it was amazing! The best part of the cake was the crunchy topping. I tried to make it myself but it never turned outright. The topping kind of melted like cake batter. It was never crunchy and crisp like my friend’s. So I gave up on Dump Cakes for a while.

It must’ve been about 3-4 months ago when I decided to give it another shot. I wanted to make a quick and easy dessert for my husband because he was craving something fruity. So, I immediately thought of a cobbler. Only I didn’t want to make a cobbler so I went with a dump cake. Nervous about my many failed attempts in the past, I went ahead and gave it a shot anyway. This time I would add cream cheese to help everything crumble together. I got this idea from a cookbook that had a bunch of recipes about dump cakes and that just stuck with me. Now, my husband really likes fruity and tart desserts. Therefore, it was only right that I used lemon cake topping and cherry filling. I figured that would do the trick. Only to my dismay, I fell in love with this cake more than he did. I took the first bite of the dump cake and that lemon cake crunch on top of that sweet and tart cherry filling was priceless! It was incredible! Then I decided to go a bit further and added a scoop of ice cream to the cake! Imagine me doing the Running Man, Tootsie Roll, and the Cabbage Patch dances all at the same time because that is what happened. The sweet and tartness of the cherries and the crunch cake topping along with the cool ice cream along with the warmth of the cake is an incredible combination. As cheap as this dessert is, it tastes like a million bucks! You can do this with just about any cake topping. If you want to use the regular yellow cake mix, it will work out just fine. You can use strawberry, blueberry, peaches, or pineapple filling. I suggest that you try this combination first because you will love it!

Recipe adapted from Taste of Home Cookbook

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