Recipe: PayDay Cake

An easy, crowd-pleasing dessert, even if peanuts aren’t your favorite!

Almost 20 years ago now, I was part of a team that traveled to Montana for a mission trip. We did VBS at a church and helped to do some repairs to another church. (As an aside, I was mostly assigned “pulling weeds” duty rather than light construction, even though I did get to do some mudding and use a nail gun.)

Each day, the families of the church where we were staying provided meals for us. I remember trying a rhubarb dessert (the first time I’d ever had rhubarb, having grown up in areas where it’s not as commonly grown) and generally liking the food, but one recipe stuck out: PayDay Cake.

Let me preface this by saying that I’ve spent most of my life saying I don’t like nuts, particularly peanuts. I’ll eat small amounts of peanut butter now, but PB&J is still something I avoid. I don’t eat pecan pie and if I’m putting nuts in something, it’s probably going to be walnuts in brownies or toasted pecans in a salad. (Though I did find a chocolate chip cookie recipe that included toasted pecans that sounded delightful!) So, when a lady came in with PayDay Cake, I pretty much wrote the dessert off.

Until I tried it—and then I think I tried to eat the entire dessert by myself. (Not really, but also I did eat A LOT of it that week.) A lady gave us the recipe, and I came home and made it almost immediately!

So, today, let’s enjoy this dessert together!

PayDay Cake Ingredients

Crust

• 1 box yellow cake mix

• ⅔ cups butter, softened

• 1 egg

Marshmallow Layer

• 2 cups mini marshmallows (If you want to use regular sized marshmallows, go for it! Just know you may not need 2 cups.)

Peanut Layer

• 2 cups peanut butter chips

• 2 tablespoons butter

• ⅔ cup corn syrup

• 2 cups Rice Krispies

• 2 cups salted peanuts

PayDay Cake Directions

1. Mix together all of the ingredients for the first layer, the crust. Press into a slightly greased 9X13 pan. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes or until the edges are golden.

2. Sprinkle the marshmallows on top of the crust. Bake for another 5 minutes.

3. In a large saucepan, melt together the peanut butter chips, butter and corn syrup. Remove from heat and stir in peanuts and rice krispies. Pour over the marshmallow-topped crust and spread evenly. Allow to cool, then cut into squares.

4. Try not to eat it all yourself!