6 Trader Joe's Sheet Cakes, Ranked

It's fair to say that I know my way around a cake. I've tested countless boxed cake mixes over the years (including several from Betty Crocker's line), tinkered with my own recipes, worked out the perfect cake-to-frosting ratio (it's 50/50), and taken the time to deeply and intimately understand what constitutes a good cake. While layer cakes have their place, the sheet cake is the ultimate homestyle dessert. Sheet cakes are one of my favorites to make because they require so little fuss: Just bake a flat cake in a rectangular pan, slap on frosting (it doesn't even matter if it looks pretty), and serve. However, with the help of Trader Joe's, you can be even closer to getting a sheet cake on the table — and it comes in a teeny-tiny package.

I am, of course, talking about Trader Joe's mini sheet cakes. Shoppers have been enamored with these cakes ever since their release, with some creative cooks even making up copycat recipes or sharing ways to upgrade the cakes' presentation. These desserts come in one size and cost less than $6, and you'll find a mix of year-round and seasonal varieties. Each cake has a sheet layer topped with flavored frosting — no frills, no gimmicks. 

I wanted to see whether these mini sheet cakes are actually tasty, though, which is why I went out and bought all the flavors I could find. I ranked them from worst to best based on the flavor and texture of both the cake and the frosting, as well as how well these elements worked together to create a satisfying bite.

I will start this out with a disclaimer: Strawberry-flavored anything is not my idea of a fun time. The only thing worse than plasticky, artificial strawberry flavor is the smell, which reminds me of walking into a Bath and Body Works during its Buy-Three-Get-Three sale. Despite my hesitation, I was genuinely surprised to find that I didn't hate this Trader Joe's mini sheet cake; I just didn't like it. At all. 

When I leaned in and took a whiff, all of my olfactory sensors went into overdrive. It was clearly made with strawberry-essence, which was nothing like the saccharine, earthy undertones of the fresh fruit that I love to eat from the berry patch. Although organic strawberry preserves and purees are listed on the ingredient label, the aroma and flavor are still plasticky, and tainted both the cake and the cream cheese frosting for me.

On the plus side, the cake base was well-baked, hearty, and dense, like a carrot cake. The flavor was like whole grains mixed with strawberries, which helped taper its more artificial-tasting notes and made it more palatable. If we ended there with the strawberries, I would have been fine. But the fact that Trader Joe's ruined a perfectly good cream cheese frosting is unforgivable. While the frosting doesn't have the most hit-you-over-the-head strawberry flavor I've ever experienced, the cloying faux-fruit taste destroyed any hope of a tangy cream cheese balancing act. If I was Trader Joe's, I'd just use a plain cream cheese frosting (or heck, even a buttercream).

Like strawberry, lemon and I are usually not on good terms. I do like the flavor in Girl Scout Cookies and lemon bars, but it is so easy to go overboard. I wasn't surprised to see Trader Joe's offer a lemon cake in its lineup, since the flavor is popular for the brand. As I suspected, how you feel about lemon will inform how you feel about this mini sheet cake flavor. 

Like the strawberry mini sheet cake, the lemon flavor was both in the cake and in the frosting. However, unlike the strawberry cake, which was plush and dense, this lemon cake was dry. It was the only cake that I tried that crumbled when I bit into it (almost like a cornbread), and the texture had some grittiness. (Is this correlated to the height of the cake, which was taller than most of the others I sampled? Possibly, but I can't be sure.) The lemon flavor in the cake was mild, so mild that I don't think I would have been able to tell it was supposed to be lemon if I hadn't read the packaging, so at least I can be grateful for that.

The frosting, meanwhile, was leaps and bounds above the strawberry one. The lemon naturally played to the tang of the cream cheese that, luckily, still tasted like cream cheese rather than a cupcake that had fallen into a container of lemon Pledge. As such, this cake was more pleasant than the plasticky strawberry cake and earned a higher spot on my list. I would have liked a more moist, muffin-like texture from the base, though, which is why this one ended up vying for a spot near the bottom of my ranking.

If there was a mini sheet cake that I was excited about in this ranking, it had to be the Dark Chocolate Ganache. When I bit into it, my hopes were crushed. I want a chocolate cake that makes the other cakes quake in their boots with its fudginess, richness, and overwhelming chocolateiness. What I got was a cake that whimpered when it needed to bark. The chocolate flavor wasn't bitter, and the cake was moist, but that chewy, fudginess was wholly missing. Although one of Chowhound's other reviewers ranked it as the best store-bought chocolate cake, this Trader Joe's offering really wasn't for me.

Since Trader Joe's had cheaped out on a quality chocolate cake, I figured that it would at least try to repay me with a heftier, ganache-like frosting. But alas, the frosting was like melted chocolate chips had been added to whipped cream; the chocolate gave it sweetness, while the whipped cream gave it lightness and spreadability, but there was little fudgy punch.

When I ate the whole thing together, it was passable (it is cake, after all), but it failed to deliver the depth that I was expecting (and by this point, craving). While this is, in my opinion, a disappointing store-bought chocolate cake, it was still more enjoyable for me than the lemon and strawberry mini sheet cakes. 

The Trader Joe's Chantilly Cream Vanilla Bean sheet cake is the one that I started with for this ranking, as I assumed its flavor would be the most neutral. While other flavors, like strawberry and lemon, may be seasonal, the Chantilly is a steadfast addition to Trader Joe's lineup and is available all year round. 

This cake is as simple as its name suggests: a basic yellow cake with a vanilla buttercream frosting. Since this cake is so simple, it should be really hard to mess up. The bottom cake layer is dark in color and thoroughly baked — more like a yellow cake that went two minutes too long in the oven — but it didn't have much flavor. It tasted like an average store-bought vanilla cake mix with almost corn-like undertones. Nothing was egregiously wrong with it, but there was also nothing spectacular going on. 

However, I knew that this ho-hum cake was just a vehicle for the copious frosting on top (finally, a 50/50 ratio of cake to frosting), which was sweet and speckled with vanilla bean pieces. Luckily, it was far from tooth-hurtingly sweet and wasn't as gritty as some of the store-bought buttercreams (and homemade ones) I've had in the past. That said, my favorite thing about this cake was the subtle tang of the buttercream — it wasn't quite cream cheese frosting-adjacent, but it still balanced the sweetness. Overall, it was a solid, crowd-pleasing cake that I would eat at a birthday party, but not so remarkable that I would drive the 45 minutes out of my way to buy it. 

I have had and made my fair share of gluten-free desserts over the years, so I understand the peculiarities of baking without gluten or wheat. Gluten gives cake structure, so when you don't have it, you have to find other ways to provide rise and lift. This was the main issue I assumed this cake would have, but when I tried it, even I'll admit that I was impressed by the immaculate texture.

The gluten-free vanilla base was a better color than the Chantilly vanilla and had more moisture. The flavor of the base was also more developed and had notes of vanilla, whereas the Chantilly cake let its copious amount of frosting do the heavy lifting. Even more impressive, the gluten-free cake had a perfectly soft crumb, yet it was still structurally sound enough to support the heavy (both literally and in terms of flavor) chocolate ganache on top. I doubt you would be able to guess the sponge was gluten-free, which is a triumph in itself. However, the more I chewed (sans chocolate ganache frosting), the more gluey it became, which is the reason it didn't earn the top spot.

As for the frosting, oh boy, that chocolate ganache was decadent. For once, I was glad that Trader Joe's wasn't as heavy-handed as it was with some of its other mini sheet cakes. It tasted like store-bought chocolate frosting, which is not inherently a bad thing. Rather, the dense chocolateiness matched the sweet vanilla base. This cake had just a little more going on than the Chantilly vanilla cake, earning it a higher spot on this list. 

Out of all of the funky-flavored Trader Joe's mini sheet cakes, the carrot one had the most potential — mainly because I don't hate carrot cake. This one keeps it super simple, foregoing the traditional (but divisive) nuts and raisins for a carrot-infused, dense base with cream cheese frosting.

The first thing that I noticed was that this cake wasn't as well-frosted as the others (namely, the Chantilly Vanilla). However, after trying just the cake itself, I felt okay with TJ's choice to go easy here, as the cake underneath was the real attraction. Its flavor was well-developed and almost toffee-like. There were warming cardamom and ginger undertones, and where I felt other store-bought brands might have shied away from spice, Trader Joe's has embraced it. What it didn't embrace, though, was the carrot, as I didn't find much evidence of this in my slice, aside from a few rust-colored specks that got stuck in my molars as I ate.

The cream cheese frosting was outstanding. There was absolutely no grittiness, and the flavor of it balanced the sweetness of the cake well. This was a mini sheet cake that I, a very critical baker and consumer, would go back for seconds on. (I may bring some of my own cream cheese icing, as I was craving a bit more from this slice.) The carrot cake's balance of familiarity, novelty, and execution earned it some brownie (err ... cake) points here and made it worthy of the top spot on my list. Just don't let Baker Joe know; we can't have him getting too cocky.

In order to remain as objective as possible and to ensure these cakes were at peak freshness, I tried each one on the day I purchased it. Since each mini sheet cake had two components — the cake and the frosting — I looked at each of them individually, as well as the overall bite. For a cake to rank high, the base had to be moist, soft, and flavorful, clearly illustrating the flavor it was trying to achieve, while the frosting had to play a supporting role. Frostings that distracted from the flavor of the cake, were unpleasant-tasting, or didn't add to the overall experience, ranked lower than ones that made the cake taste better in some way. Although I like a well-frosted cake, I did not inherently rank a cake lower if there was less frosting, as the more flavorful and structurally sound cakes — like the gluten-free vanilla and carrot cake — didn't really need more frosting in order to work. 

Overall, while I do think the Trader Joe's mini sheet cakes are grossly overhyped and should only be purchased in a last-minute "Oh, that potluck is tonight?" occasion, I will say that the top two cakes on this list did earn a marginal amount of respect from me as a home baker and cake enthusiast. Granted, there is some subjectivity, especially for the lowest-ranked cakes, and I do hope this list will guide your selection process and help you find a dessert that you, and everyone you share it with, will enjoy.