Earlier this week I told you I would share a recipe for a blackberry dump cake. I like a good dump cake – grab some ingredients, dump them in a cake pan, pop in the oven and out comes a scrumptious warm dessert that is perfect paired with cool creamy ice cream. Yum!
I have a nephew that works on a blackberry farm in Pennsylvania, so I pretty much always have beautiful berries in my freezer. They are some of the biggest berries I have seen! We use them to make cobbler, jam, syrup, and most recently, Blackberry Bourbon Lemonade. I’m not a big alcohol drinker, but that lemonade is so delicious that I just have to treat myself once in a while.
So they other day I wanted to make a dessert using the berries in my freezer and I wanted something different than cobbler. So I decided to try to make a dump cake to see if it would work. And guess what? It did!

Making the cake is easy. First, take four to six cups of berries and stir in a cup of sugar and 3 or 4 tablespoons cornstarch. You can adjust the sugar depending on the sweetness of the berries, and use more or less cornstarch depending on the juice in the berries. I used about 6 cups of berries, 1 cup of sugar, and 3 TBSP cornstarch.

After you have the berry/sugar/cornstarch mixture stirred well, pour it into a regular size (13″ x 9″) cake pan.
Next, sprinkle a dry cake mix over the top of the berries. You can use a white cake, vanilla cake, whatever floats your boat. I felt like a lemon cake mix when I made mine. I thought the tartness of the lemon flavor would pair well with the sweetness of the blackberries.

Now, slice a stick of butter into small pieces and lay on top of the cake mix. I know, I know, you’re saying “Beth, a WHOLE stick of butter?!?” And I’m saying to you – YES, use the whole stick. This is dessert, people!

You want to be sure to have butter pieces covering the top or you’ll end up with dry, cakey sections and no one wants that!
Pop it into the oven at 375 degrees for 60 minutes. You’ll end up with this yumminess:

Now comes the difficult part. You want to wait for a few minutes so the hot filling can cool slightly before you dive in. Waiting is just so hard! Serve your cake warm with a scoop of ice cream, or with a dollop of whipped cream – your choice. Or you can go rogue and eat it all by itself. No matter how you choose to eat it, it’s going to be yummy.

I loved the way this dish tasted. The berries were sweet, the lemon cake mix had a tangy bite, and the two combined are berry heaven. And the butter adds a richness that puts the dish over the top.
I would love to hear if you have a favorite dump cake recipe. They are so easy, and so delicious, and I’m always looking for new recipes to try. Let me know if you try this one and what you think of it!
Blackberry Dump Cake
- 4-6 cups fresh or frozen blackberries
- 1 cup sugar
- 3 TBSP cornstarch
- 1 cake mix
- 1 stick butter
Preheat oven to 375.
Mix berries with sugar and cornstarch. Pour into 13″ x 9″ cake pan. Sprinkle dry cake mix over top of berry mixture.
Cut stick of butter into pieces and place on top of dry cake mix.
Bake for 60 minutes.
Enjoy!
This is a new concept in baking for me. Looks yummy!
Dump cakes are so versatile, you can use a variety of fruits. I have been tempted to do a blueberry dump cake but I might eat the whole thing myself. 🙂
Yum. I remember my mom making these cakes when I was a kid. So easy and so yummy. There was a pumpkin version that I loved.