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This is the dessert I make when I want everyone to think I tried way harder than I did. Four ingredients, five minutes of dump-and-go, and a Slow Cooker that does the rest of the work for you.
It’s a dump cake — unglamorous name, ridiculously good result. Canned peaches, dry cake mix, butter, a little cinnamon, and a few hours later your kitchen smells like a bakery. No mixing bowls, no mess, no real effort. Just a golden, bubbly, buttery peach dessert that disappears fast every time I make it.
Why You’ll Love It
- Only 4 ingredients — canned peaches, cake mix, butter, cinnamon. Nothing fancy required.
- 5 minutes of hands-on time — dump, sprinkle, dot with butter, walk away.
- No mixing required — the layers do all the work in the Slow Cooker.
- Practically foolproof — I’ve made this dozens of times, sometimes a little burnt on the edges, sometimes with the wrong cake mix flavor — it’s never once turned out bad.
- Crowd-pleaser every time — the buttery, crackly topping is what people fight over.
A Few Thoughts on the Ingredients
Canned peaches — don’t overthink this. I usually grab whatever’s cheapest, which around here is the store brand, and honestly I can’t tell the difference between that and the fancier ones. Heavy syrup makes it sweeter, juice makes it a touch more “fresh” tasting, I guess, though we’re not exactly going for fresh here. We’re going for comfort.
The cake mix — yellow, always yellow, though one Thanksgiving I only had spice cake in the house and it was genuinely incredible, almost better, don’t tell my mother-in-law I said that.
Butter — real butter, not margarine. I tried margarine once during that same broke stretch I mentioned and it just sort of… sat there greasy on top instead of melting into that golden crackly thing it’s supposed to do. Lesson learned.
Cinnamon is optional but honestly I don’t know why you’d skip it.
What You Need
2 cans of peaches, 15 ounces each, syrup or juice, your call (I almost always use syrup, sue me)
1 box yellow cake mix — the 15.25 oz size, though if yours says 15.1 or 16 don’t panic, it’ll be fine
½ cup butter, a full stick, melted or sliced thin, whatever mood I’m in that day
about a teaspoon of cinnamon, give or take, I never actually measure this one
How I Actually Make It
Okay so first you grease the Slow Cooker — I use a 6-quart, always have, my sister has a smaller one and hers always overflows a little and she still hasn’t bought a bigger pot, I don’t get it. Butter or spray, doesn’t matter.
Dump both cans of peaches in, juice and all, and just sort of even them out with a spoon. Don’t get fussy about it.
Now here’s the part everybody messes up the first time, including me, back in 2009 or whenever it was — you do NOT stir in the cake mix. I cannot stress this enough. I once had my daughter “help” when she was maybe nine and she stirred the whole thing together because it seemed like the obvious thing to do, and we ended up with this gluey peach paste that nobody could even identify as cake. So — sprinkle the dry cake mix over the top of the peaches, evenly as you can manage, and just leave it. Walk away from the spoon.
Cinnamon goes on top of that. Sprinkle it around, doesn’t need to be precise.
Then the butter — and this part matters more than people think — you want it covering as much surface as you can. If you’re melting it, drizzle it back and forth like you’re icing something. If you’re using slices, lay them out like you’re tiling a floor, slightly overlapping, no big gaps. The bare spots stay dry and kind of sad. The buttered spots turn into this golden, almost-crispy topping that’s the whole reason anyone eats this.
Lid on. Low for three to four hours, or high for two to three — I usually do low because I’m out of the house most mornings and I like coming home to it already done, slightly anxious the whole drive that I left the stove on instead, which I didn’t, I never have, but I always think it.
When it’s done the top looks set, kind of golden, bubbling around the edges. Turn it off and just — let it sit there, lid off, for fifteen, twenty minutes. I used to skip this step because I was impatient and you end up with soup. Good-tasting soup! But soup.
Other Ways I’ve Made This
My Mother does it with a can of crushed pineapple swapped in for one of the peach cans and it’s genuinely good, tastes like something you’d get on vacation somewhere warm. My sister adds pecans on top before the butter goes on, toasted ones if she’s feeling ambitious, which is rare. I tried the Cherry pie filling version once for a work lunch thing and people liked it but I personally think it gets a little too sweet, almost cough-syrupy, though I seem to be the only one who thinks that.
I’ve also done the fresh peach version in summer when they’re cheap and falling off the trees at the farmers market — more work, obviously, peeling and slicing, but there’s something nice about it too. Frozen works in a pinch, just don’t add extra sugar if they’re already the sweetened kind, learned that one the hard way, way too sweet, almost couldn’t finish a bowl.
Leftovers, If There Are Any
There usually aren’t, but on the rare occasion — fridge, covered, about four days. The topping goes a little soft and loses that crackly thing but it’s still good, maybe even better honestly, more like a cobbler at that point. I microwave individual bowls for like thirty seconds, sometimes forty if I forgot about it on the counter for a while, which happens more than I’d like to admit.
It freezes too, if you’re the type who plans that far ahead. I am not, usually, but Stan likes having something in the freezer for when his brother shows up unannounced, which happens more than either of us would like.
4-Ingredient Slow Cooker Peach Dump Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cans peaches 15 oz each, with syrup or juice
- 1 box yellow cake mix about 15.25 oz
- 1/2 cup butter melted or thinly sliced
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
Instructions
- Lightly grease the inside of a 6-quart slow cooker with butter or nonstick spray.
- Pour both cans of peaches, including the syrup or juice, into the slow cooker. Spread them into an even layer.
- Sprinkle the dry cake mix evenly over the peaches. Do not stir.
- Sprinkle the cinnamon evenly over the cake mix.
- Drizzle the melted butter over the entire surface, or arrange thin butter slices across the top with as few gaps as possible.
- Cover and cook on low for 3–4 hours, or on high for 2–3 hours, until the topping is set and the filling is bubbling around the edges.
- Turn off the slow cooker, remove the lid, and let the dessert rest for 15–20 minutes before serving.