Slow Cooker Pecan Cobbler
Slow Cooker Pecan Cobbler is a warm dessert that makes its own caramel-y sauce while it cooks. The smell alone is enough to make you want to make this dessert on repeat but let me also tell you that the real work is just about 15 minutes with a skillet, measuring cups, a bowl, spoon, and whisk. No mixer. No oven. No baking skills of any kind because it’s cooking away in the crockpot instead of taking up oven space.
Desserts like this are often called self saucing cakes because that’s exactly what they do, they make a sauce beneath the cake that can be served OVER the cake or just with the cake. I like drizzle the sauce over the cake, but you do you!
I am a big believer in appliances like the crock pot that do the work while I do something else, and this recipe is no different. You mix, you pour, you put the lid on, and a couple hours later you have something that tastes like it took real effort.
Why Make A Dessert In The Slow Cooker Anyway?
This is a dessert for eight people that costs you 15 minutes and a couple of things you can wash up while it cooks. It frees up your oven completely, which matters when your oven has a waiting list and you still need to make a dessert.
Ingredients For A Pecan Cobbler
Everything here is basic pantry stuff except maybe the pecans but if you’re like me and you specialize in pecan pie then you probably have a cup of pecans kicking around somewhere. Walnuts will work too if that’s what you have, or a mix of walnuts and pecans.
- all-purpose flour
- granulated sugar
- baking powder
- salt
- milk
- unsalted butter
- vanilla extract
- chopped pecans
- brown sugar
- hot water
Ingredient Notes
A few notes on that list. Use hot water, not boiling and not lukewarm, hot tap water is fine. The heat helps the brown sugar dissolve so you don’t end up with a gritty layer at the bottom. Be sure to stir the sugar into the hot water until the mixture is no longer gritty. Stick your clean finger in to feel it, you’ll know if it’s gritty or not.
Most milks work. Whole milk, 2%, even evaporated milk will work. I don’t know anything about nut milks or other alternative milks because I don’t use them. If you try it, let me know how it works.
Did You Just Mess This Up?
Probably not, it’s pretty hard to mess up this recipe but here is what COULD go wrong, because that happens. Do you even have to ask how I know?? HA!
- You stirred the water in. It’s the number one thing. If you stir it, you don’t get two layers, you get one thick pudding-ish cake with sauce mixed all through it. It is still completely edible. It is not what the recipe promised, but nobody at your table is going to send it back.
- It looks like soup for the first hour. Correct. Leave the lid on and stop checking. Bwhahahaha!
- The middle is jiggly at the end and you think it’s raw, but it is not raw. It’s supposed jiggle. The top should be set and spring back when you touch it lightly. The middle underneath is sauce. If you cook it until nothing jiggles at all, you have probably cooked the sauce away. No worries it still tastes good!
- If your slow cooker runs hot it will cook much more quickly. But if you know and love your slow cooker then you probably know that it runs hot and you’re going to take that into account when cooking this. Start checking at the EARLY end of the range, which means 2 hours on low or 1 hour on high. An older, hotter cooker can scorch the edges of the sugar layer while the middle is still going. If yours is one of those, use low, always.
- Your cake is a SOGGY mess. That’s because you chose to ignore the paper towel line in the directions. Condensation drips off the lid and pits the top. If you don’t have paper towels lay a clean kitchen towel across the pot before you put the lid on. It catches the dripping water from the lid. Don’t let it hang down near the heating element.
- It sticks to the crock insert. You didn’t grease the sides well enough. The brown sugar layer is basically caramel and caramel has now welded itself to the pot. Grease it well, all the way up the sides, not just the bottom.
- Your sauce is thin. You have to actually let it sit the full 15 minutes with the cooker off and the lid off before you serve. I know it’s a pain in the butt to wait when it smells like that (LOL!) but the sauce thickens as it cools and it makes a real difference in how it spoons up.
Got Leftovers?
Cover it and put it in the fridge for up to 4 days. Here is the thing, overnight, the cake absorbs most of the sauce. Day two, you have a moist pecan-y/vanilla cake and not much visible caramel. It is not ruined and you didn’t do anything wrong, that is just what happens with these self-saucing cakes.
Slow Cooker Pecan Cobbler
Ingredients
For the batter:
- 1 cup chopped pecans
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 2 tsps baking powder
- 3/4 tsp salt divided
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/4 cup salted butter melted
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
For the caramel:
- 1 cup brown sugar packed
- 1 1/2 cups hot water
Instructions
- Before you begin lightly toast the pecans in a dry skillet just until they begin to brown, about 5 minutes should do it, then set them aside until you're ready to add them
- Grease the inside of the slow cooker well, this keeps the cobbler from sticking as it cooks low and slow
- In a mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, and 1/4 tsp of salt
- Stir in the milk, melted butter, and vanilla extract until just combined
- Spread the batter evenly across the bottom of the greased slow cooker
- Sprinkle the chopped pecans evenly over the batter
- In a separate bowl, stir together the brown sugar, 1/2 tsp of salt, and hot water until the sugar is mostly dissolved
- Pour this mixture slowly and evenly over the top of the batter and pecans, do not stir it in
- Add two layers of paper towels over top of the crock and put the lid over them
- Cook on low for 2 to 3 hours, or on high for 1 to 1.5 hours, when you’re ready to see if it’s done take the lid off and careful peel off the paper towels to look at it
- It’s ready when the top is set and springs back lightly to the touch, the middle should still be slightly jiggly with visible sauce around the edges, that’s the caramel layer doing its job underneath
- Turn off the slow cooker and let it sit uncovered for about 15 minutes before serving, this allows the sauce to thicken slightly
- Serve warm, spooned into bowls so you get both the cake layer and the caramel sauce underneath
- Add with a scoop of vanilla ice cream if you’d like
