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This Peach Pecan Chess Cake is here and ready for your weekend! I’ve probably mentioned this a thousand times, but I have all of my grandmother’s recipes that she typed up on index cards with her typewriter many many years ago. Some of them have little notes on them and they make me so happy and I want to frame them in my kitchen some day.

I came across her recipe for Chess Cake recently and had never heard of it before. Obviously I love me some chess pie (here and here) and figured it was a similar and cake-ier version of that. (It is!) It’s full of brown sugar and pecans, and it’s firm and a little crisp around the edges with a gooey center. SO good.

I wanted to add something to it and it felt like the perfect canvas for some summer peaches. I tested this recipe a couple of times using canned and fresh peaches and I’m happy to report that you can use both!

This Peach Pecan Chess Cake is super simple to make and comes together quickly and easily! You literally just mix everything together in a bowl, arrange some peach slices in your cake pan, pour the batter over it, and top with the rest of the peaches. The hardest part is that it bakes for a whole hour and you have to wait.

The recipe in the index card makes a 9×13 sized cake, but I adjusted it a little to fit a 9-inch cake pan. There is a better photo below of the original recipe if you’d like to make it in a rectangle pan, though!

Because this cake is gooey like a chess pie, you’re probably not going to get a perfect slice. It’s more of a scoop and serve kind of cake. It’s diviiiine when served warmed with a dusting of powdered sugar and a scoop of ice cream. It would be so perfect with a cup of coffee and I promise not to judge you if you have some for breakfast.

You can, of course, switch up the fruit too! I think it would be equally amazing with any stone fruit or blackberries or even apples with a bit of cinnamon. Omg. Definitely going to have to make an apple version in the fall!

For now, I hope you enjoy this Peach Pecan Chess Cake as much as I did. Happy baking!

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Peach Pecan Chess Cake

Prep Time: 30

Cook Time: 1

Total Time: 1 30

Ingredients

6 tbsp butter melted
1 ½ cups light brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
½ cup whole milk
3 large eggs
1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
¾ cup finely chopped pecans
3 fresh peaches sliced *
Powdered sugar for dusting

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F and spray a 9-inch cake pan with baking spray.
In a large bowl, add melted butter, sugar, vanilla, and milk. Mix on medium speed with an electric mixer until incorporated.
Add eggs one at a time, beating after each. Mix in flour and fold in pecans.
Arrange half of your peaches in the cake pan and pour batter over the top, smoothing with a spoon. Arrange second half of peaches over the top. (I had about 22 peach slices total.)
Bake for 1 hour, tenting with foil halfway through baking to prevent too much browning around the edges.
Let cake cool; best served warm with powdered sugar on top and a scoop of ice cream.