Today we are excited to share a uniquely light and flavorful recipe with you for Pink Champagne Cake.
This elegant dessert, with its moist champagne infused layers & delicious buttercream is perfect for weddings, engagement parties, anniversaries, Valentine's Day, New Year's Eve, or any occasion that calls for something special.
Why Pink Champagne Cake? A Quick History!
Southern bakers have been flavoring their cakes with sweet beverages for decades (cocoa cola cake, 7 up cake, etc.)...but Pink Champagne cake takes that practice to a whole new level of delicious sophistication.
It is believed that Pink Champagne Cake first originated on the west coast in the '50s and '60s, and was a hugely popular choice for bridal showers, weddings, and bachelorette parties.
There's just something a bit glamorous about a dessert flavored with Pink Champagne, don't you think? The Los Angeles Times printed a Pink Champagne Cake decades ago and to this day it remains one of its most requested.
If you like Pink Champagne, you are going to fall in love with this recipe. While the pink champagne isn't overpowering, the flavor is unmistakable.
We love to fill it with our Pink Champagne Buttercream Frosting, but traditionally pink champagne cakes have often been paired with bavarian cream or coconut fillings.
We hope that you enjoy this fantastic recipe. Make sure to check out our other Pink Champagne Cake (doctored cake mix version) linked below, as well as our Strawberries and Champagne Cake!
More champagne cake recipes!
If you are looking for an easy doctored cake mix version of Pink Champagne Cake, we love this DELICIOUS recipe!: Pink Champagne Cake (doctored cake mix) Recipe.
Also, don't miss our Champagne and Strawberries cake recipe!
This amazing recipe consists of Champagne & Strawberry cake layers, a whipped strawberry cream cheese filling, and Champagne & Strawberry Buttercream Frosting!
Find the recipe here: Champagne and Strawberries Cake
We've also created a delicious Champagne Pound Cake as well!
More Cake Tutorials and Recipes
Don't miss our other favorite tried and true cake recipes in our Cake Recipes Section!
If you are interested in learning more about cake decorating, we have lots of fun cake tutorials to share in our Free Tutorials section, including a Free Cake Videos section!
Thanks so much for stopping by! We hope that you enjoy this champagne cake as much as we have!
Pink Champagne Cake {Scratch Recipe}

This flavorful Pink Champagne Cake will make any occasion feel more special!
Ingredients
For the Pink Champagne Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, grease and flour 3 (8 inch) pans
- 3 cups (342 g) cake flour
- 1 Tablespoon (15 g) baking powder
- ½ teaspoon (2g) salt
- 6 egg whites (194g)
- 1 cup (242g) pink champagne, I used Andre Blush Champagne
- 2 teaspoons (8 g) vanilla
- 2 Tablespoons vegetable oil (18 g)
- 2 cups (400 g) sugar
- 1 cup (2 sticks) (226 g) unsalted butter, softened slightly
- Small amount of pink food color, I used AmeriColor Deep Pink but any pink would be fine. I added the color with a toothpick, just a small amount will give you blush pink
For the Pink Champagne Buttercream
- 4 sticks (452g) unsalted butter, softened
- 12 cups (1380g) powdered sugar (depending on the desired consistency, more sugar = more crusting) If you prefer a frosting that crusts less, see the note at the bottom of the recipe.
- 4 teaspoons ( 16g) vanilla
- 1 teaspoon (6g) salt
- ½ cup (122g) pink champagne
- Pink Coloring Gel of Choice (We used a touch of Americolor Deep Pink)
Instructions
For the Cake
- In a medium size bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside
- In another bowl combine the egg whites, champagne, vanilla and vegetable oil. Whisk until blended and set aside.
- In the bowl of your mixer, cream the butter and sugar 3 to 5 minutes. When it is light and fluffy add approximately ⅓ of the dry ingredients and mix until blended. Then add ½ of the liquid ingredients mixing until blended. Continue alternating dry and wet ingredients. Begin and end with dry ingredients (3 additions of dry and 2 wet). Add the pink color at any time during the mixing of the dry and wet ingredients. *Makes 7 ½ cups of batter.
- Pour into prepared pans and bake 25 to 30 minutes. The cake is done when a toothpick inserted the center comes out clean. Cool in baking pans 10 min. then turn out.
For the Pink Champagne Buttercream
- Cream the softened butter until smooth and lightened in color
- Blend in the salt and vanilla
- Gradually add the powdered sugar with the champagne until the powdered sugar is incorporated. Beat at medium speed 3 to 4 minutes. The texture will become very smooth. If you are tinting the entire batch of buttercream light pink, you can add a very small amount of coloring gel while it is mixing.
- This recipe makes approximately 8 cups of frosting.
Notes
A Note about the Buttercream...
*For a softer buttercream with a much lighter crust, cut the amount of powdered sugar from 12 to 9 or 10 cups and cut the amount of champagne form ½ cup to ¼ cup + 1 Tablespoon. Also, cut the salt to ½ teaspoon. This lighter consistency works well for cupcakes or cakes that don't require the Viva method of smoothing.
Hi,
Your recipe seems delicious. If I wanted to cut the sugar in the icing down to 9 cups, I calculated that it would amount to 1035g in weight measurements. Am I correct?
Yes, that is correct. I hope you will enjoy the recipe.
Do you beat the egg whites til just frothy or til stiff peaks?
Looking forward to making this cake for my daughter in laws birthday❤️
Hi Janet, glad you are making this! We actually don't whip up the egg whites separately. We simply combine the egg whites and other wet ingredients until blended.
We love this recipe- but I also wanted to mention that we just added another version of Pink Champagne Cake last week-- we used it for our Champagne & Raspberries Cake linked below. In this one, the pink champagne layers are made using the traditional method of mixing (rather than reverse creaming) and use 3 whole eggs rather than 6 egg whites. Both are great recipes!
https://www.mycakeschool.com/recipes-tutorials/champagne-and-raspberries-cake/
How many servings does this make? Thank you
You should be able to get 15 servings.
Hello, sadly I cannot buy Andre Blush anywhere in my area or online. Is there an alternative fruity champagne I can easily purchase?
Hi Thanh! I know very little about different types of champagne ;0) We just happened to buy that brand and were happy with it. I think most champagnes would be fine- we've had people comment on having good results with various sparkling wines, prosecco, white champagne, etc.
How long can I refrigerate this cake before it starts to dry out? Making it for my wedding and would like to do this a 3-4 days ahead of my wedding but don’t want it to dry out really bad.
Thank you!
Hi Jessica, you can bake the cake layers at any time, and freeze the layers individually up to three months before you need them and as long as they are tightly wrapped in plastic wrap and foil, they will taste fresh. When it's time to frost the cake, thaw the layers (still wrapped) for an hour or so before assembling the cake.
If you are wanting to actually assemble, frost, and refrigerate the finished cake well in advance, we like to serve cakes by the third day of putting it all together. The frosting will keep it from drying out. Keep it in an airtight cake dome or sealed bakery box. Hope you enjoy it!
Can you use this recipe for cupcakes?
Hi Liz! This recipe should be fine for cupcakes- they will likely have little to no dome, just like the cake layers. (This is true for most of our scratch recipes).
I made this today. it's delicious, but it took almost 45 minutes in my new oven. I was testing the recipe for a cake for my granddaughter s baptism. I have a cross cake pan that says it holds 2 9" pans of batter. Should I measure out a certain amount of batter to bake in the cross pan? Not sure how to do this. I also used Barefoot Bubbly Pink Champagne instead, and it worked great. Thanks!!
Hi Lisa, If your cross pan holds 10 cups of batter, you should be fine to pour all of the batter into your pan. We have not baked in this type of pan so I can't be sure of the baking time. Hope all goes well.
Great. I'll measure it out. Thanks so much for commenting! The cake really is delicious!!