We have fallen in love with this flavorful scratch Strawberry Cake recipe. If you've been searching for "the one", this is it! The search is over ;0)
This homemade strawberry layer cake has become one of our favorite desserts, with it's moist and soft cake layers and big strawberry flavor.
There are so many frostings that would pair perfectly with this cake, but cream cheese frosting may be my favorite.
Frostings that Taste Great with Strawberry Cake
This moist strawberry cake is bursting with wonderful strawberry flavor, and tastes amazing with these frostings and fillings (and many more)!
A Strawberry Cake Recipe with Frozen Strawberries
Not only do I absolutely LOVE the flavor of this strawberry cake, I also love that it calls for frozen strawberries!
This means you don't have to wait for strawberry season to roll around in order to enjoy the BEST strawberry cake recipe. You can make it year-round, and you should!
Of course, if you would rather use fresh strawberries for a fresh strawberry cake, you absolutely can- and we often do during strawberry season. We think you'll love the fresh strawberry flavor that more than a cup of strawberry puree lends to the cake.
Thanks to Mom (our BeBe) for making sooo many versions of strawberry cake until we found our favorite. I have to admit though, it was fun sampling all of those different versions of strawberry cake along the way!
Reverse Creaming Method of Mixing
*This cake calls for the Reverse Creaming Method of mixing, for a moist & tender cake. The ingredients are added in a different order than the traditional creaming method, resulting in a slightly tighter crumb and velvety texture.
We explain the steps in our recipe instructions, but you may find it helpful to watch our free video tutorial on the Reverse Creaming Method, which you can find here: The Reverse Creaming Method of Mixing.
*If you would prefer to use the traditional creaming method for this fresh strawberry cake recipe, you can find it in the Chocolate Covered Strawberry Cake recipe linked below!
How to Make Strawberry Cake
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. (This recipe uses the reverse creaming method as is explained above.)
Grease and flour three 8 x 2 inch round cake pans - I like three layers because it gives us an extra layer of filling. *We also like to line our prepared pans with parchment circles.
- In a separate bowl, combine room temperature eggs, strawberry puree, vanilla, strawberry extract, pink food coloring (if desired). Blend together with a fork.
- In the mixing bowl for your stand mixer, hand whisk the dry ingredients (cake flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, and salt) for 30 seconds to combine. With your mixer on low to medium speed, and using the paddle attachment, add the pieces of butter, a few pieces at a time, also add the oil at this time. Mix until the dry ingredients form moist crumbs that look like coarse sand.
- Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl. With the mixer on LOW speed, SLOWLY add ½ of the egg mixture/wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, increase the mixer to medium speed and beat for 1 ½ minutes, the batter will be thick and fluffy.
- Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl, then add the remaining egg mixture in 2 pourings, beating 20 seconds after each. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl and pour the cake batter into prepared pans.
Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake layer comes out clean. Let the cake cool in the pans on wire racks for 10 minutes. then turn out. This recipe makes about 7 ½ cups of batter.
Will this Strawberry Cake Recipe work for Cupcakes?
Yes, you can make strawberry cupcakes with this recipe, however they will have little to no dome. This true for many of our scratch cake recipes.
Decorating the Strawberry Cake
Decorate the Strawberry Cake however you like with your favorite strawberry frosting or a recipe that pairs well with strawberry flavor. We crumb coated our cake with Cream Cheese Frosting and then immediately piped the spiral patterns that you see in the photo using a star tip 21.
I love the piped-all-over look and it is also very forgiving! Simply start piping in the center and spiral outward, clockwise as many until you reach the size that you want. Repeat until the cake is finished ;0)
Doctored Cake Mix Version of Strawberry Cake
If you prefer a doctored boxed cake mix recipe, we have a great one for you: Strawberry Cake: Doctored Cake Mix Recipe.
This easy strawberry cake always gets rave reviews and uses real strawberries along with other flavorings for a delicious strawberry flavor.
More favorite strawberry cake recipes!
We've made so many strawberry cake recipes and strawberry frostings & fillings over the years! Here are some of our favorites--
- Homemade Strawberry Cake
- Berry Chantilly Cake
- Chocolate Covered Strawberry Cake
- Strawberry Sour Cream Cake
- Strawberry Whipped Cream Cheese Filling
- Strawberry Champagne Cake (Doctored Cake Mix)
- Champagne and Strawberries Cake
- Strawberry Pound Cake
- Strawberry Lemon Cake
- Fresh Strawberry Filling for Cakes
- Strawberry Buttercream Frosting
- Strawberry Daiquiri Cake
My Cake School- Sharing Our Best Cake Recipes and Cake Tutorials!
Don't miss our full collection of favorite cake and frosting recipes in our Recipes Section! We also have a huge Free Cake Tutorials Section if you're interested in learning sweet and simple cake decorating techniques.
Strawberry Cake from Scratch
This moist and flavorful Strawberry Cake from scratch is a favorite year-round!
Ingredients
- 4 large eggs, room temperature ( can warm the eggs by putting in a bowl of warm water for 5 minutes)
- 1 ½ cups (340 g) strawberry puree ......I used frozen strawberries that were lightly sweetened, you could also use fresh.....puree the strawberries in food processor or blender
- 1 teaspoon (4 g.) vanilla
- 2 teaspoons (8 g) strawberry extract
- 2 to 3 drops AmeriColor Pink or your pink coloring of choice (optional but makes for a prettier shade of pink)
- 3 cups (342 g) cake flour
- 1 ¾ cups (350 g) granulated sugar
- 1 Tablespoon plus ½ teaspoon (14 g) baking powder
- 1 teaspoon (6 g) salt
- ¼ cup (50g) vegetable oil
- 1 stick (½ cup) (113 g) unsalted butter, cut butter into small pieces so it can be added slowly during mixing process. I cut mine into ½ to 1 inch slices onto waxed paper on the countertop, letting it soften only about 5 to 6 minutes.
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. (This recipe uses the reverse creaming method.)
- Grease and flour three 8 x 2 inch round pans
- In a separate bowl, combine eggs, strawberry puree, vanilla, strawberry extract, pink coloring (as desired). Blend together with a fork.
- In the bowl of your mixer, hand whisk the dry ingredients (cake flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, and salt) for 30 seconds to combine. With your mixer on low to medium speed, add the pieces of butter, a few pieces at a time, also add the oil at this time. Mix until the dry ingredients form moist crumbs that look like coarse sand.
- Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl. Method is important when using Reverse Creaming, so with the mixer on LOW speed, SLOWLY add ½ of the egg mixture to the dry ingredients, increase the mixer to medium speed and beat for 1 ½ minutes, the batter will be thick and fluffy.
- Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl, then add the remaining egg mixture in 2 pourings, beating 20 seconds after each. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl and pour into prepared pans.
- Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let the cake cool in the pans 10 min. then turn out.
- Makes 7 ½ cups batter IF USING FONDANT: If using fondant to cover the cake, our first choice is to cover the cake in ganache for a nice firm shell before laying on the fondant. You could also use all butter buttercream, that is well chilled to firm it up before the fondant.
- Cupcakes: This recipe will work for cupcakes, they will have only a slight dome**We frosted our cake with this Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe. (I piped spirals of frosting in varying sizes with my Wilton star tip 21.)
Recommended Products
As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, I earn from qualifying purchases.
Delicious Cake Recipes, Online Cake Decorating Tutorials, and More!
We hope that you enjoy this Strawberry Cake! It has become a personal favorite over the years, especially in the warmer months when we're craving light and fruity cakes and cupcakes!
If you give this strawberry cake a try, we would love to hear what you think! Make sure to leave a comment or photo in the comments below!
For even more of our favorite cake recipes, make sure to stop by our Cake Recipes Section. This includes all of our favorite cake recipes, favorite frostings, and more!
If you are interested in learning more about cake decorating, we have tons of creative cake tutorials on our site! Make sure to scroll through our Free Cake Tutorials Section, which also includes a Free Cake Video Tutorials Section!
We think it helps with making a cake moist but if there is a time issue this recipe will be fine. Frosting a cake also helps to retain moisture. Keeping it covered in the refrigerator will retain moisture also. Because it is a sheetcake, chill the completed cake to firm up the frosting, then cover in plastic wrap. Remove from the refrigerator a couple of hours before serving. Take the plastic wrap off before the frosting softens. Hope all goes well.
Thank you so much! I was thinking of putting it in a bakery box and wrapping the box in plastic wrap while in the fridge. Fidnt thibk about just wrapping the cake! You're the best!!!
Thank you so much! I was thinking of putting it in a bakery box and wrapping the box in plastic wrap while in the fridge. Didn't think about just wrapping the cake! You're the best!!!
Wrapping a bakery box is perfect then you will be ready for transporting.
Hi, I am looking forward to making your strawberry cake, when i liquify the frozen strawberries should I drain off the excess liquid? I wasn't sure if the cake will be too soggy. I don't want to spoil it..
Hi Wendy, I did not thaw my frozen strawberry enough to have liquid to drain. I thaw them just enough to cut into pieces so they will puree faster. Measure 1 1/2 cups (340 grams) puree and all will be good. I hope you will enjoy the recipe.
If my strawberries were unsweetened, would you add sugar to the purée before adding it into the recipe? Thank you ????
Hi Tim, Some strawberries are sweeter than others. You could taste one of the strawberries and see what you think. If you think they are not sweet enough, I would use only 1 to 2 tablespoon sugar because there is 1 3/4 cup sugar in the cake. The only frozen strawberries that were available to us when we made the cake were slightly sweetened.
My daughter asked for a strawberry cake with strawberry buttercream for her 30th. I would love to know how to adjust the recipe for a 9x13 because that is what she asked for. I find a 9x13 does not always bake up level, but frosting fixes many problems. She is not a fan of cream cheese frosting, so I guess I’m on the hook for SMBC unless adding strawberry powder will provide enough tart to cut through the sweet of an American buttercream. What do you think? I’m a fan of reverse creaming, so I think yours will yield a great cake
Hi Laurie, This recipe makes 7 1/2 cups of batter and this is enough for a one layer 9x13 sheet cake. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes. Check at 30 minutes. We have never used strawberry powder in our cakes or frostings but I don't think it would cut the sweetness of buttercream. You can cut the sweetness of American buttercream with the addition of salt. Begin with 1/2 teaspoon salt, adding more as needed. Does your daughter like mascarpone? It is similar to cream cheese but is less acidic and has a very light and creamy taste. Below is a link to our Lemon Buttermilk cake recipe, it uses a Whipped Lemon Mascarpone frosting. If you substitute strawberry extract for the lemon extract and leave out the lemon zest you will have a Whipped Strawberry Mascarpone frosting. It is a very light tasting frosting. Another option is to add pureed strawberries to the top of you baked and cooled sheet cake or just sliced strawberries would be good. Top the strawberries with Whipped Cream. You could decorate the top with more strawberries. I will add a link to our whipped cream recipe below. Hope she loves her cake.
https://www.mycakeschool.com/?s=lemon+buttermilk+cake
https://www.mycakeschool.com/recipes-tutorials/sweetened-whipped-cream/
Wow. Thank you so much for replying, and so quickly, and with such great options. You have answered all my questions, and more.
How about trying strawberry preserves in this?? What do you think? I bake under Texas Cottage Law and can't use real strawberries but they do allow preserves. I've got a cupcake recipe that I use them in and it does perfectly.
Hi Robin, We have not tried using strawberry preserves, so I'm not sure of the outcome. It's good to know that you had success using it in cupcakes. Please let us know if you give it a try with this recipe.
Hi, I have made this recipe several times over the last few years and it has always come out great, but last night, after baking and letting the layers cool, I noticed they shrunk in size in the cake pan. What happened? I've never had a cake shrink before.
About how long does it take to mix the dry ingredients, butter, and oil until it is the texture of coarse sand? Thank you.
Hi Rachel, it can vary a little but I would say under a minute-- maybe 30-45 seconds. You can find more details on the reverse creaming method here if you'd like to see our video:
https://www.mycakeschool.com/reverse-creaming-method-of-mixing-a-cake-video-tutorial/
Thank you so much!