This easy White Almond Sour Cream Cake (Doctored Cake Mix Recipe) is delicious, dense enough to hold up to fondant, versatile enough for cupcakes, and sturdy enough to handle light carving.
Some bakers want to work exclusively with scratch recipes, while others prefer to only work with doctored cake mixes. I have recipes that I LOVE that fall into both categories. Whether it is a scratch cake recipe or doctored doesn’t matter so much to me as how the cake tastes!
This White Almond Sour Cream Cake is a great example of a tried and true doctored cake mix recipe that would please any crowd.
I love the flavor and texture of this cake. The sour cream in the recipe gives it a nice density without being too heavy. I like almond desserts and so for me, the hint of almond in this cake recipe is delicious.
However, if you are not an fan of almond, no problem! Simply leave the almond flavoring out and you will have a fantastic White Sour Cream Cake recipe to serve your friends and family.
If your cake calls for more extensive carving, or tapering as with a topsy turvy design, the much denser “Durable Doctored Cake Mix Recipe” in our Recipes section is probably the best bet. This White Almond Sour Cream cake is very versatile. You can substitute other cake mix flavors with great results.
We also have a fabulous Chocolate (doctored cake mix) version of this cake which you can find here!: Chocolate Sour Cream Cake: Doctored Cake Mix Recipe.
We discovered this popular White Almond Sour Cream Cake years ago on CakeCentral.com (where it is very well known and often abbreviated as WASC). We use this recipe often, but also get rave reviews for our scratch version of this cake which can be found here: Scratch White Almond Sour Cream Cake Recipe.
White Almond Sour Cream Cake {Doctored Mix, Extended Recipe}
Ingredients
- 1 box cake mix, sifted (we use cake mix without pudding in the mix)
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- generous dash of salt
- 1 cup sour cream or plain yogurt (greek yogurt is fine also)
- 1 cup water
- 3 whole eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 1/2 teaspoon almond or lemon extract or you can use all vanilla (optional)
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour two 8x2 round cake pans. In the bowl of your mixer, combine dry ingredients and whisk at least 30 seconds to blend. In another bowl, combine sour cream, water, eggs, & flavorings. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix on medium speed for 2 minutes. Stop after 1 minute to scrape the sides and bottom of bowl then continue to beat for the second minute.
- Pour into prepared pans and bake at 325 degrees....check at 35 minutes to see if middle of cake springs back when touched, a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake come out clean or with just a few crumbs attached, and the cake will be slightly pulled away from the pan. We bake at 325 degrees to decrease the height of the dome on the cakes.
- Makes about 7 cups of batter. Works well for cupcakes.
We also have an amazing White Almond Sour Cream Cake from scratch recipe! You can find it here & pin or print it for later: White Almond Sour Cream Cake from Scratch!
Thanks for stopping by! We hope that you enjoy this White Almond Sour Cream Cake recipe! For a full collection of our FAVORITE frosting and cake recipes, make sure to stop by our Recipes section!
(*The cake in our photo was frosted with our Classic Vanilla Buttercream. We used the beautiful piped buttercream technique which we teach in our free video tutorial for Cascading Rosettes of Buttercream!)
Hi Michelle, Yes, you can use Betty Crocker with pudding in the mix. It will be slightly firmer and very good. I have used it many times.
instead of adding one cup of water, can I add one cup of maraschino cherry juice? thank you and happy baking
Hi Donna, It should work fine. It will give your cakes a pink tint and a nice cherry flavor. Let us know your thoughts after you make your cake.
Hello
Your cakes are heavenly!
I bake my grandchildren’s birthday cakes; they choose the theme. So far I have made
over 100 cakes; the decorating usually takes 12 hours to incorporate their themes from frosting.
I need to make a sheet cake which takes 3 Duncan Hines cake mixes. Would I have to double your recipe to get enough cake batter for the pan. I will be putting a cross shaped pan (1 cake mix) on top as this is a Baptism cake. I thought your almond cake would be much better than the plain Duncan Hines white mix. I frost with old fashion Crisco frosting in order to make decorations.
Hi Susan, Thank you for the nice compliment. It is wonderful that you bake all the cakes for your grandchildren! This recipe makes 7 cups of batter. I think a Duncan Hines cake mix makes approximately 5 cups of batter, so you have been using 15 cups batter in your sheet pan. According to the cake chart showing batter amounts that we use, a 12 x 18 pan needs 14 cups batter. If that is the size of your pan, you will be fine to double the recipe. Below are links to 2 charts that I think you will find helpful in determining the amount of batter you will need.
link to fromkarenskitchen.com
link to wilton.com
Hello from Las Vegas! I am very excited to try your recipe for WASC cake using a Betty Crocker Super Moist 16.25oz mix. My only apprehension is the eggs. Your version calls for 3 whole eggs instead of using all egg whites. I want my cake pure white with no hint of pale yellow at all. So my question is: how many egg whites would I use, 3 or 4…keeping in mind the addition of the flour, sugar and sour cream. Thank you so much for your expert opinion!
Hi Natalie, Use 4 egg whites and clear vanilla for a white cake. Hope you will enjoy the recipe
Hi BeBe. I’m doubling this recipe to make a 12×18 sheet cake. May be a silly question, but how long would you suggest to leave in pan to cool before turning out? And, when turning out, should it be on a cooling rack or directly on to the cake board?
Hi Nancy, Line your cake pan with parchment to prevent sticking. You can use either, but we let the sheet cake cool on a wire rack for 10 to 15 minutes then place a cake board over the top of the sheet cake pan. While holding the cooling rack and the cake board together, flip the two over to get the cake onto the cake board. It would be a good idea to tape 3 cake boards together for stability when moving or carrying the cake. Cover the cake board with plastic or cake foil as it will be the serving board.