This incredibly moist honey cake is sweetened entirely with pure honey—no added sugar needed! It offers a deep, rich honey flavor and a wonderfully tender texture. Best of all, it’s simple to make!
Why You’ll Love This Honey Cake
It was a bit of a struggle getting this honey cake right, but after a lot of trial and error I honestly feel that this is one of the best honey cake recipes out there! Here’s why:
Packed with honey flavor: This honey cake actually tastes like honey! It has pure honey in the cake batter and is topped with a simple honey/butter glaze that deepens the honey flavor even further. I made sure to balance all the flavors to make sure the honey flavor was prominent, but not overpowering.
No added sugar: This recipe uses honey alone to sweeten the cake – no added sugar! I was tempted to try adding some brown sugar when I couldn’t quite get the texture right, but I decided to persist with using honey alone, and I’m so glad I did!
Soft texture: Many honey cake recipes are very dense (due to the nature of honey), so it was quite a challenge achieving a soft and fluffy texture with honey alone. After trialling a few different methods, I decided to use the hot milk method (that I use in my eggless vanilla and eggless chocolate cake recipes) in order to thin out the honey before adding it to the batter and make for a somewhat fluffy texture. It worked like a charm!
Easy to make: This honey cake is so so easy to make! No complicated method to follow and no hand mixer (or stand mixer) needed either. It also doesn’t have multiple cake layers or any frosting, but is topped with a super simple honey/butter glaze—the perfect quick and easy dessert!
How to Make Honey Cake
You can find the full list of ingredients in the recipe card at the end of the post (for easy navigation, hit the ‘jump to recipe’ button at the top of the blog post). Here is just a quick visual breakdown of the recipe (recipe video is also provided in the recipe card below).
Preheat oven to 180 °C (350°F) conventional and lightly grease an 8×3 inch cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper as well.
In a medium sized bowl sift together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, salt and ground cinnamon. Using a whisk, mix until well combined and set aside.
In a large bowl add in melted butter, oil, vanilla and eggs. Using a whisk, mix until well combined and smooth. Set aside.
In a small bowl combine milk and honey. Heat in the microwave (or in a saucepan over a stove) for 30 seconds, give the mixture a stir so the honey and milk is combined and then continue to heat it up until it’s hot to the touch. Set aside.
To the butter/oil/egg mixture, add in the pre-sifted dry ingredients from earlier and using a whisk, mix until just combined. Do not overmix. Add in the hot milk/honey mixture and again using a whisk, mix until just combined and smooth. The batter will be quite thin.
Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan. Drop the cake tin lightly on the counter to remove any large air bubbles and then scatter the sliced almonds evenly over the top.
Bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs on it. Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 20 minutes, before turning it out onto a wire rack, and then turning it out again onto your serving plate so it’s the right side up (see video for demonstration).
Glaze: Combine the honey and butter and melt in the microwave (or over a stop top) until smooth. Using a pastry brush, gently brush the glaze all over the top of the cake (the glaze adds great additional honey flavour to the cake so don’t skip it). Serve while still slightly warm (although it’s great at room temp too!) and you can also pair it with whipped cream or ice cream 🙂
How to Store Honey Cake
This cake can be stored at room temperature in an airtight container for a few days, after which it’s best to place in the fridge for up to a week.
Easy Honey Cake (Rich & Moist!)
Print Pin VideoIMPORTANT: For accuracy, I would recommend using the gram measurements provided, as those are the exact quantities I use. Cup measurements are given as estimates (based on US cup measurements) to make it easier for those who do not have a scale.
Ingredients
Honey Cake
- 1 cup (120 g) all purpose flour
- ¼ cup (30 g) cornstarch
- 1½ tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ¼ cup (56 g) unsalted butter - melted
- ¼ cup (52 g) unflavored vegetable oil - I use canola oil
- 1½ tsp vanilla extract/essence
- 2 large eggs - room temperature
- ½ cup (120 g) whole milk
- ½ cup (170 g) honey - I prefer using a liquid honey for this cake
- ¼ cup (25 g) sliced almonds
Honey Glaze
- 1½ tsps (10 g) honey
- 1½ tsps (8 g) unsalted butter
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180 °C (350°F) conventional (see note 1 if using a convection oven with a fan) and lightly grease an 8x3 inch cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper as well.
- In a bowl sift together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, salt and ground cinnamon. Using a whisk, mix until well combined and set aside.
- In a large bowl add in melted butter, oil, vanilla and eggs. Using a whisk, mix until well combined and smooth. Set aside.
- In a small bowl combine milk and honey. Heat in the microwave (or over a stove) for 30 seconds, give the mixture a stir so the honey and milk is combined and then continue to heat it up until it's hot to the touch. Set aside.
- To the butter/oil/egg mixture, add in the pre-sifted dry ingredients from earlier and using a whisk, mix until just combined. Do not overmix. Add in the hot milk/honey mixture and again using a whisk, mix until just combined and smooth. The batter will be quite thin.
- Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan. Drop the cake tin lightly on the counter to remove any large air bubbles and then scatter the sliced almonds evenly over the top.
- Bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs on it. Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 20 minutes, before turning it out onto a wire rack, and then turning it out again onto your serving plate so it's the right side up (see video for demonstration).
- Glaze: Combine the honey and butter and melt in the microwave (or over a stop top) until smooth. Using a pastry brush, gently brush the glaze all over the top of the cake. Serve while still slightly warm (although it's great at room temp too!) and you can also pair it with whipped cream or ice cream 🙂
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information are estimates only as they are automatically calculated by a third party application. Actual values may differ based on brands and types of products used.
17 Comments
This recipe came out great and I’m not even a regular baker! What kinds of adjustments do I need to make to do this in cupcake form for my toddler’s birthday?
So so happy to hear that Sarah! 🙂
This should work fine as cupcakes just reduce the cook time to around the 18 min mark so they don’t overbake 🙂
Would this be suitable for use in a 3 layer cake? I’d like to make a cake with honey flavored layers and was eyeing this recipe since all your other cakes are so wonderful
Hi Yasmine! Yes I think this would work great as a layer cake 🙂
So glad you’re enjoying the recipes and hope you enjoy this one just as much 😀
Another unbelievably moist and delicious cake.
And so easy to make.
Love your recipes!
Thanks so much Hina! So glad you loved the honey cake 😀
Excellent recipe, congratulations.
I just added chocolate chips.
I made it in a Wilton mold D18 but next time I will use the D15 and I am sure it will be fine. For cooking, I put the mold in a cast iron casserole with a lid like when I bake my bread without kneading. 45 to 50 minutes at 180 ° C, it was perfect.
We ate it with a little custard, a treat.
Thanks for sharing
MICHEL31
Thanks so much Michel! So glad to hear you loved the recipe 😀
A little custard on the side sounds delicious!! I’ll have to try that sometime 🙂
I made this cake the other day (it’s gone now 😅) and it is DELICIOUS! The texture is really soft and light, and it’s not overpoweringly sweet but you get the flavor of the honey. Definitely one to make again!
Yay! So so happy to hear you loved the honey cake Rachel 😀
Really appreciate the wonderful feedback 🙂
Hi, this looks great! I want to make this today in a loaf pan, if possible. I don’t have cornstarch, but I have tapioca starch and masa (corn flour treated with lime). Would either be a suitable replacement? Thanks in advance!
Thanks Shirley! 🙂 I haven’t tried tapioca or masa as a substitute for cornstarch myself so I am not too sure how well they would work sorry, though I think tapioca may be the more appropraite option out of the two. Alternatively, you could use regular all purpose flour, the cake may just not be as soft at the end, but should still taste great!
Would love to hear how it goes if you decide to try with the tapioca 🙂
Hi
Could you substitute the all purpose flour for brown flour?
Hi Aiysha! 🙂 I haven’t tried that myself, and usually brown flour can result in a different texture when used in cakes compared to all purpose flour. You may also have a less moist cake. You could try substituting half of the all purpose flour with whole wheat flour to see how that goes and if you’re happy with the texture, then you can try a full substitution the next time around 🙂
Would love to hear how it goes if you decide to try it out!
I enjoy your recipes. I recently tried your coconut sheet cake recipe and my kids loved it. Thanks for sharing your recipes.
Yay! So so happy to hear you’re enjoying the recipes Nafisat and that your kids loved the coconut sheet cake 🙂