Turtle Cake

The first time I had this cake, I was working as a secretary in the corporate world. I didn’t have any kids then and didn’t do a lot of baking at that point. Another secretary brought in turtlecake for someone’s birthday and I thought she was a Queen Baker.

I asked her for the recipe. I can’t remember the first time I made it, but I did just recently for an event. If you like turtles—those candies with chocolate, pecans and caramel, then you’ll probably like turtle cake.

Mix, according to the directions, a swiss or german chocolate cake mix. Pour half of the batter into a 9x12 glass (greased) pan.

Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

While that’s going on unwrap a bag of Kraft caramels. This will take you about 6 minutes to unwrap the caramels. Melt ¾ stick of butter in saucepan, add caramels and ½ cup evaporated milk.

The original recipe said to melt over medium heat. I kept mine on low as I was in between the upstairs and downstairs kitchen and doing multiple things. This way I was sure not to burn the caramels. Once I could pay attention to the mixture, I turned the heat up to medium and total it took about a good 20 minutes to melt the caramels (the last 5 minutes was on medium heat). Once melted, add 1 cup chocolate chips and 1 cup chopped pecans, stir and pour on top of the already baked cake.

Then spread remaining cake batter on top of caramel mixture.

Bake another 20 minutes or until cake is done.

No icing is needed because the caramel mixture in the middle give it what it needs.