Irish Potato Cake

  4.7 – 25 reviews  • Irish

The taste of homemade turkey and stuffing was something I missed, even if even the smallest turkey is too much for two people. With a boneless turkey breast, I tried this recipe, and it was fantastic.

Prep Time: 20 mins
Cook Time: 1 hr 30 mins
Total Time: 1 hr 50 mins
Servings: 12
Yield: 1 10-inch cake

Ingredients

  1. 2 cups all-purpose flour
  2. 2 teaspoons baking powder
  3. 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  4. 2 teaspoons ground cloves
  5. 2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
  6. ⅛ teaspoon salt
  7. 2 cups white sugar
  8. ⅔ cup shortening
  9. 2 large eggs
  10. 2 cups mashed cooked potatoes
  11. ¾ cup milk
  12. 1 cup chopped walnuts
  13. 1 cup raisins

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease and flour a 10-inch Bundt pan.
  2. Sift flour, baking powder, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and salt together into a bowl.
  3. Cream sugar and shortening in a large bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Mix in flour mixture alternately with mashed potatoes and milk. Stir in walnuts and raisins. Pour batter into the prepared pan.
  4. Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 1 1/2 to 2 hours.

Nutrition Facts

Calories 466 kcal
Carbohydrate 70 g
Cholesterol 39 mg
Dietary Fiber 3 g
Protein 6 g
Saturated Fat 6 g
Sodium 107 mg
Sugars 43 g
Fat 20 g
Unsaturated Fat 0 g

Reviews

George Russell
Substitutions I made were 1/2 c cocoa for 1/4 cups flour and added 1 tsp vanilla.
Michael Farrell
This is yummy. I read the reviews and reduced the cloves and nutmeg but kept the cinnamon the same. Followed the rest of the recipe. The baking time at 90 minutes would probably been a moister cake but decided to go 10 minutes longer just because of the time in the directions. We had a serving with fresh sliced strawberries and enjoyed it.
Dominique Coleman
I’d make this again. We had a lot of leftover mashed potatoes from a dinner party that I used and it came out good! Made as directed.
Susan Rogers
amazingly good! Who would have thought you can put potatoes in a cake? I cut the spices in half and cooked it in two 9inch cake rounds. I then cut the rounds horizontally and made a four layer cake. I also substituted butter for the fat instead of crisco. I then frosted it with cream cheese frosting (8oz Philadelphia cream cheese, 6oz butter, 4 1/2 cups confectioners sugar). This was amazingly delicious. It took about 90 minutes and was crazy moist. You could even cook it longer if you wanted it to be drier, but be careful because the outside of the cake will get really hard. This was so good! I’ll definitely make it again.
Sabrina Johnson
Mine came out very moist, and not in the least bit dense. So surprising that cake is based off mashed potato. I baked got 14 regular sized muffins out of this and followed other’s suggestions to half the spices (except for the cinnamon). I also cut the sugar down by a few tablespoons since my mashed potato already had sugar in it.
Jenny Richardson
I have this in the oven right now. I followed the recipe very close, the only change I made was Pecans in the place of walnuts. I used cold mashed potatoes so that I was not adding anything too warm to the mixture of eggs and sugar. It has to cook for a long time, but so far it smells wonderful. I notice a lot of people think the spices are too much, the beauty of trying new things is that you can adjust them as needed. I also saw that someone wanted to use apples in the place of raisins. I might try that in addition TO the raisins. It came out very well! Dense texture, I enjoy the spices, but can see where some would like to tone it down. It is very moist but if I had cooked it any longer it would be dry on the outside. I think served with a fruit compote it would make a really good desert. I will use this again.
Michael Jones
Really good! My husband took this to work for St. Patrick Day potluck at work. My husband said everyone just raved over this cake! Thanks for the recipe!
Robert Mitchell
This came out really good. It reminds me of zucchini bread. The only change is the next time I will cut the cloves in half. I think the baking time is a little long. My cake, in a 10 inch bundt pan, was done in 75 minutes.
Toni Irwin
Absolutely amazing cake!! I did however make a few changes. I used 1 1/2 tsp of cinnamon, 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice, combo of margarine and butter (instead of shortening, reduced the amount of nuts and raisens to 1/3 cup each, added 1/2 apple and 1 1/2 tsp vanilla. Ok, I did alter the original recipe a bit (but based my changes on other reviews and not liking cloves.) I took this to a St Pat day dinner and car smelled like a delish aromatic potato cake. Everyone started eating the cake BEFORE dinner was served!! Once they started eating it……..no one stopped until it was finished! If I didn’t see it happen I wouldn’t believe it. lol btw – I’m not a sweet eater but did love, love this cake. Due to the natural sugars in the potatoes I think I will be able to reduce the sugar to 1 1/2cups next time. Oh, and it did take almost 2 hours to bake.
Robert Robertson
Excellent recipe. It is perfectly spiced, moist and delicious. The potatoes make for a dense, wonderfully rich cake recipe. This is like taking a bite out of a dessert made by my Great Grandma. Thanks for sharing, this recipe has now become a permanent favorite in our house. Vanilla ice cream is yummy with it. 🙂
Stephen Hunt
My sister, cousin and I found this recipe and thought it sounded so intriguing we’d make it for a lark just to see how it came out…we had all the ingredients…even cooked fresh potatoes and mashed them…the only thing that was substituted was pecans instead of walnuts because that’s what we had. We were tempted to add or change things but decided to stick with the recipe exactly and in the end we are glad we did because it came out absolutely splendid! Moist and just the right spicy..not too much or too little. We brought it a St Patrick’s Day Party last night and it was a hit…everyone loved it!!! It’s definitely going to be made again! And it’s easy!
Jill Gonzales
Made this for the Saint Patrick’s Day party I went to last night. It was delicious! People are very surprised when you tell them it’s made with two cups of mashed potatoes! (By the way, I used instant mashed potatoes and it came out great.) Terrific recipe; thanks!
Andrew Maxwell
This wasn’t too difficult to make, and the cake turned out just as it was supposed to, but I did not enjoy the flavor like I thought I would. Maybe it was the spices used but it did not taste how I expected it to. Like I said, it looked just like the picture and came out to a perfect texture, but it just didn’t taste good 🙁
Samantha Brown
I made this for my daughter’s 2nd grade class for Multi-Cultural Day and it was devoured! Thankfully, I had brought along this amazing recipe so I had it when I was bombarded by the other parents!! Now, I’m pressed by my neighbors to make it! A very moist and delicious cake! And very easy to make!
Joshua Beasley
Superb texture and flavor!! I only had 1 cup of mashed potatoes, so I cut the recipe in half and made 13 muffins. (Hint: to prevent muffins from sticking to paper liners, spray the liners with Pam.) They were perfectly done in 30 minutes. They smelled so good, I couldn’t wait to try one. Tasted delicious warm. Great use for leftover mashed potatoes. I’m sure I’ll be making these again. Thanks for the recipe!
David Lewis
I made this for St. Patty’s Day and everyone at work LOVED it! It’s a dense, rich almost bread-like cake. Thanks for a wonderful recipe! (I just added a milk & confectioners sugar glaze with green food coloring to be festive!)
Jordan Baker
This is the best thing ever.
Anthony Chen
I have never had potato bread/cake before, and was curious. This was absolutely delicious! I love it, and am eating a piece right now. This is a recipe I will keep in my cookbook.
Dr. Bryan Harrington DVM
Made this for St Patricks Day and everyone who came to supper liked it. The recipe was so easy my 4 year old helped make it. The only change I made was to cut the cloves down to 1 teaspoon per other reviewers suggestions. This recipe will definitely become a St Patricks Day tradition in our house.
Steven Russell
Next time I will cut the cin, cloves, nutmeg by half. Strong flavor. I’m also going to try it with apples instead of raisens.
Cathy Hall
I added 1 tsp vanilla and cut cloves & nutmeg to 1 tsp each. I baked as 6 mini cakes. I also made a glaze with confectioner’s sugar, milk & vanilla to drizzle over them and topped each with a maraschino cherry. They were moist, pretty, spice cakes — and no one knew they were made with leftover mashed potatoes.

 

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