For years, I’ve used this Texas sheet cake recipe. It makes enough cake for a large gathering, and my kids always preferred it to any other on their birthdays. Delicious and moist. really simple to create. Enjoy!
| Prep Time: | 10 mins |
| Cook Time: | 20 mins |
| Total Time: | 30 mins |
| Servings: | 32 |
| Yield: | 1 10×15-inch cake |
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 cups white sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup sour cream
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup butter
- 1 cup water
- 5 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
- 6 tablespoons milk
- 5 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
- ½ cup butter
- 4 cups confectioners’ sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup chopped walnuts (Optional)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 10×15-inch jelly roll pan.
- Make cake: Combine flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a mixing bowl. Beat in sour cream and eggs.
- Melt butter in a saucepan over low heat. Stir in water and cocoa powder. Bring mixture to a boil then remove from the heat. Allow to cool slightly, then stir cocoa mixture into the flour and egg mixture until blended. Pour batter into the prepared pan.
- Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 20 minutes.
- While the cake is baking, make icing: Combine milk, cocoa powder, and butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil, then remove from heat. Stir in confectioners’ sugar and vanilla, then fold in walnuts, mixing until blended.
- Spread icing over warm cake.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 256 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 36 g |
| Cholesterol | 36 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 2 g |
| Saturated Fat | 6 g |
| Sodium | 145 mg |
| Sugars | 28 g |
| Fat | 13 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Very good, made cupcakes instead of the cake but baked it 350 degrees for 20 minutes.
Using corrected instructions aside, I used all the recipe’s ingredients as written. Having never made a “Texas Sheet Cake” before, I was pleasantly surprised how simple and tasty it is! The video is a great help.
This cake was easy to make and my whole family loved it, especially my one and two year old grandsons! I have always loved Texas sheet cake, but had never made one myself. I will definitely be baking this again.
I made it as written – but made a 1.5 times batch. It was a little thicker in my pan so took about 30 minutes to cook. It turned out delicious!
I decreased the sugar in the cake to 1 C. and then in the icing to 2.5 C. I also used Cacao instead of cocoa. Was sweet enough for our family like that.
Next time I will use less frosting. I have made this before and it’s as delicious as it was before. They will love these at church.
i made the cake,&amd; the frosting was messed up,spread on the cake,& it ripped the cake all up,1st time i used this recipe, my fault, waist of my time, now i have cake bites, made this to take to my daughters, so embarrassed won’t be taking it, amd; i used all Walmart Brands, I make this every year,&amd; never have a problem, but i tried this reieipy,& it messed up, never again, waisted to many ingedients
I have made this kind of sheet cake many times before and this version was terrible. I made the mistake of following the directions to put the sour cream and eggs in before th cocoa mixture. DON’T! Do it the other way!
I did not make the cake I just made the frosting
For the reviewer who said the frosting was too thick. The recipe is fine, you just boiled the sugar, cocoa and butter too long. You can also just use less powdered sugar. This is a great recipe.
tasted just like the texas sheet cake I made as a kid. My dad had a best friend who owned a bike. I made him these cakes for rides 🙂 Brings back very happy memories.
An additional cup of toasted nuts to the icing would make it even better.
Both my Church group and family loved this recipe which I made with reducing the cocoa powder by 1 tablespoon in the cake mix and also 1 less tablespoon in the frosting. I did add walnuts to the frosting as recommended.
Great recipe, loved by whole family. I added 1 teaspoon of cinnamon into the batter.
I baked my cake in a 9 x 13 springform pan because I don’t have a 10 x 15 pan. It took 40 minutes to bake. I used 3.5 cups of powdered sugar in the frosting and it was a bit too sweet for us. I have made many chocolate cakes from scratch and I was somewhat disappointed in the end results of this one. With all the butter plus the sour cream, I expected this cake to be super moist. And it was not. I doubt very much that I will make this again.
First time making this wonderful cake that my MIL always has prepared when we visit. So easy! Follow recipe but did add the c. pepper and cinnamon as suggested by other reviewers. Came out perfect in conv oven at about 17 minutes. Don’t worry that it barely covers the pan. That is what this cake does. I also put my icing pan back on the burner after it was turned off and this makes the c sugar fold in. You have to stir, stir, stir to keep this from setting up before it gets poured on the cake. I opted for the pecans. The recipe ingredients are correct, so if it doesn’t come out correctly, its operator error…just saying. Try again, it’s worth it!
This is NOT a true Texas Sheet Cake. The original recipe from over 75 years ago has 1-1/2 teaspoons Cinnamon and 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon Cayenne Pepper. Other than that, all the ingredients are basically the same.
I really liked this recipe. I followed it exactly and found the 9×15 pan to be the perfect size, despite some other reviewers saying that it wasn’t. Next time I will probably use a different icing as this was just too sweet for me, and I have a huge sweet tooth so that is saying a lot! I may just try the same frosting with less powdered sugar. The cake paired very well with vanilla ice cream. I had to cook for about 26 minutes to get the toothpick to come out clean. I worried that the edges might end up overcooked but they were just fine.
I have made this cake for 40+ years. Very easy to make and so delicious! I don’t make any changes to the recipe or prepping. Always a hit with everyone!
The frosting was too thick and I followed the recipe to the tee….. it does not pour and thin like it should. Very disappointed.
PERFECTION!! This was the most beautiful Texas sheet cake I’ve ever made! I weighed my ingredients (into grams on my digital scale), & I think that made all the difference. The only tweaks I made: 1- added some Heilala Vanilla Paste to the batter as well as the frosting 2- I whisked the boiling chocolate water into the dry ingredients, the added the egg/sour cream mixture This cake got gobbled up faster than my cherry & apple pies! Too bad, because the cake is better on days 2 & 3, if it ever lasts that long. 😀