Strawberry Velvet Cake

This soft, light Strawberry Velvet Cake has a fine crumb, velvety texture, and wonderful flavor. Moist cake layers are filled with whipped cream and fresh strawberries, and frosted with cream cheese frosting. You will love this recipe!

We've made many "velvet cakes" over the years! Named for their velvety soft texture, almost all of these cakes have one thing in common- a block ofsoftened cream cheese. You cannot taste the cream cheese, but it results in a really nice texture.

Some of our most popular velvet cakes are: White Velvet Cake, Lemon Velvet Cake, Coconut Velvet Cake, and Vanilla Velvet Cake. Today's recipe is similar to our White Velvet Cake in that it calls for egg whites rather than whole eggs. This makes the Strawberry Velvet Cake even lighter and fluffier!

A look at our Ingredients

You can find the full, printable recipe at the bottom of this post. Here is a quick look at our main ingredients for the cake layers.

• Reduced strawberry puree (Reduce 1 cup of strawberries in a saucepan over medium heat for about 15 minutes or so until thickened and reduced to ½ cup).
• Unsalted Butter, softened (salt will be added separately)
• Black of Cream Cheese, softened to room temperature
• Sugar
• Egg whites
• Cake Flour makes for an extra tender cake (thanks to the lower protein content)
• Baking soda, baking powder, salt
• Buttermilk's acidity makes for an even softer crumb.
• Vegetable Oil
• Vanilla extract & strawberry extract
• Sliced fresh strawberries - folded into the cake batter

*We also made a filling of whipped cream and sliced strawberries, and cream cheese frosting.

How to Make a Strawberry Velvet Cake

Today's cake is similar to our Homemade Strawberry Cake, only with egg whites instead of whole eggs, buttermilk, and strawberries that have been reduced. It has a lighter consistency that reminds me of our popular White Velvet Cake recipe.

You can find the full, printable recipe further down in this post, here is a quick look at our steps!

Strawberry Reduction

The first step of this recipe is to make a strawberry reduction, which reduces the liquid in the strawberry puree, concentrating the flavor. This step can even be done the night before.

• Stirring occasionally, we simmered a cup of pureed strawberries in a saucepan for about 15 minutes until it had thickened and reduced by about half. We poured into a bowl to cool before adding to the cake. You can pop it in the refrigerator to speed up the cooling.

Preparing the Batter

• First, mix the room temperature cream cheese and butter until smooth. Add the sugar and mix on medium until fluffy (about 3-4 minutes).
• Then, add the egg whites to the batter, one by one, mixing a bit after each addition.

• Next, we ALTERNATELY added the combined dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt) and the combined wet ingredients (buttermilk, extracts, vegetable oil, and strawberry reduction) to the butter/sugar mixture in the mixing bowl. Begin and end with the dry mixture.
• Finally, we stirred in the ¾ cup of finely sliced strawberries and scooped the batter into two 9 inch cake pans.(Three 8 inch pans would work with this recipe also).

• Once baked, we allowed them to cool on the cooling rack in their pans for five minutes before turning them out.

Putting it all together

• While the cake layers were cooling, we prepared whipped cream and sliced strawberries for the filling, as well as a simple cream cheese frosting. There are many fillings and frostings that could work with the strawberry velvet cake layers.
• Once cooled, we placed the first layer on a cake pedestal. Then, we piped a dam of frosting (about a half inch from the edge), and filled it with whipped cream topped with strawberry slices. Then, we added the top cake layer.
• Fill in any gaps between the layers with buttercream, and add a thin layer of frosting. At this point, we like to chill the cake to firm everything up before adding the final layer of frosting. Decorate however you like!
• We kept things very simple, texturing the frosting with an offset spatula. We also added a chunky shell border (1M tip), and topped with fresh strawberries.

More Cakes with Strawberries!

We love strawberry cakes and have made many over the years! Some of our most popular are our Strawberry Sour Cream Cake, Easy Strawberry Cake from Cake Mix, Champagne and Strawberries Cake, Strawberry Shortcake with Pound Cake, and Strawberry Lemonade Cake just to name a few.

Strawberry Velvet Cake

BY Melissa and Bebe

This moist Strawberry Velvet Cake is soft and light with wonderful strawberry flavor. It makes a great cake for birthdays, Valentine's Day, spring & summer gatherings, and more! This can be made as a two layer 9 inch cake or three layer 8 inch round.

Prep Time: 20 minutes mins

Cook Time: 35 minutes mins

Course: Dessert

Servings: 15 servings

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Ingredients

• ▢ 8 oz (226g) cream cheese, room temperature (we used one 8 oz package, full fat.)
• ▢ 1 ½ sticks (168g) unsalted butter, room temperature (or close to room temp) (shouldn't be overly soft)
• ▢ 2 cups (400g) sugar
• ▢ 6 egg whites room temperature
• ▢ 3 cups (342g) cake flour See notes if substitution is needed.
• ▢ 2 teaspoons (8g) baking powder
• ▢ ½ teaspoon (3g) baking soda
• ▢ ½ teaspoon (3g) salt
• ▢ ¾ cup (182g) buttermilk (See Notes for substitution)
• ▢ ¼ cup (54g) vegetable oil (We use canola oil)
• ▢ 1 teaspoon (4g) vanilla extract
• ▢ 2 teaspoons strawberry extract or baking emulsion (We used McCormick) (8g) (If you don't have strawberry extract, you could also use 1½ tablespoons strawberry jello powder instead. Without any strawberry flavoring, the cake will still have strawberry flavor but it will be much lighter.)
• ▢ ½ cup Reduced Strawberry Puree (We started with one cup pureed/blended strawberries (about 8-10 oz) and reduced it in a saucepan to ½ cup.) Fresh or Frozen strawberries are fine.
• ▢ ¾ cup fresh strawberries, sliced into small pieces. (plus additional for in between cake layers)
• ▢ Pink Coloring Gel/Food Coloring (optional)

Filling

• ▢ 1 cup (240g) heavy cream
• ▢ ¼ (29g) cup powdered sugar
• ▢ 1 (4g) teaspoon vanilla extract
• ▢ sliced fresh strawberries (about ½ cup -¾ cup. Adjust to your liking.)

Cream Cheese Frosting

• ▢ 2 sticks (226g) unsalted butter, slightly softened
• ▢ 16 oz cream cheese softened (452g)
• ▢ 2 teaspoons vanilla extract (8g)
• ▢ ½ teaspoon salt (2g)
• ▢ 6 cups confectioners sugar (690g) (Adjust amount up or down to your liking)

Instructions

Strawberry Reduction

• Use a blender to liquify/puree strawberries (approx 8-10 oz) to make one cup of puree. Pour into a saucepan and heat over medium heat in a saucepan for about 15 minutes. **If you don't have a blender, you can mash the strawberries as the heat in the saucepan, using a fork or potato masher, etc.
• Heat at a gentle simmer (rather than a rapid boil), reduce to low-medium as needed. It will thicken and reduce. Stir occasionally. Once it has reduced by about half, pour into a measuring cup of heat proof bowl and allow to cool. (You can refrigerate to speed up the cooling). If you reduced to under ½ cup, supplement with a little water to reach ½ cup.

  **It is fine to do this step the day before if you'd like and refrigerate. The purpose of reducing is to have all of the flavor of one cup of strawberries without the excess liquid.

For the Cake Layers

• Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour two 9 inch cake pans. We like to line the bottom of our cake pans with circles of parchment paper. *If you prefer three layer cakes, you can also use three 8 inch pans.
• Next, separate your eggs, saving only the 6 egg whites for this recipe. Set them in a bowl to the side.
• In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt for 30 seconds and set aside.
• Wet Ingredients: In another bowl or measuring cup, add the buttermilk, vegetable oil, and vanilla extract and strawberry extract, and cooled, reduced strawberries. Set aside.
• In the bowl of your mixer, add the butter and cream cheese and mix at medium speed until smooth.
• Gradually add the sugar and mix at medium speed for 2-3 minutes.
• Mixing on low speed, add the 6 egg whites one at a time (it's fine to estimate as they are all in the same bowl), mixing to incorporate after each addition.
• With the mixer on low speed, alternately add the flour mixture and the buttermilk/strawberry mixture, beginning and ending with the flour mixture (We did 3 additions of the dry mixture, 2 additions of wet). If you'd like to add pink coloring, you can do that at any time.
• Mix the batter just until well combined- be careful not to over-mix. Gently stir in the ¾ cup of finely sliced strawberries. Divide the batter between the two prepared 9 inch pans.
• Bake at 325 degrees F for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean or with just a few crumbs attached, adjust time as needed.) *Baking times may vary slightly. (If baking three 8 inch layers, start peeking in after 25 minutes).
• Once done, remove from oven and let cool for 5-10 minutes in the pans on a wire rack before turning out.
• This recipe makes 7 ½ cups of batter.

For the Whipped Cream Filling

• Chill the mixing bowl and beaters/ whisk attachment in the freezer for 10 minutes.
• Pour the whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla extract into the chilled mixing bowl, begin beating on low speed gradually increasing to medium high speed.  
• The cream begins to thicken (approx. 1 ½ minutes) and stiff peaks form- be careful not to overmix. This happens fairly quickly! At "stiff peak" stage, peaks form and hold their shape when beaters are lifted. This is when it's ready.

For the Cream Cheese Frosting

• Add the softened butter to the bowl of your mixer. Beat on low to medium speed until the butter is smooth.
• Cut the softened cream cheese into pieces and add to the butter, along with the salt, mixing at low to medium speed until incorporated. If you are using a hand mixer you may need to soften the cream cheese a bit more.
• Add the vanilla. Gradually add the powdered sugar mixing on low speed until blended.
• Increase mixing speed slightly and beat until fluffy. Be careful not to overmix.
• This frosting will pipe best if used while still chilled. You can make it in advance, refrigerate and when ready to use, let it soften slightly (do not microwave) and remix.

Assembling the Cake

• Place the first strawberry velvet cake layer on the pedestal or cake plate. Pipe a dam of the frosting around the edge of the cake (about ½ inch from the edge) using a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away. If you don't have a piping bag, just keep the filling from the edge of the cake to prevent it from escaping from the sides.
• Fill the top of the layer (within the dam) with whipped cream. Top with sliced strawberries.
• Top with the second cake layer.
• Fill in any remaining gaps between the cake layers with frosting using the piping bag with tip snipped away. Crumb coat the cake with a thin layer of frosting. Chill in the freezer for 10-15 minutes (or longer in the refrigerator) to firm things up.
• Apply second coat of frosting, smooth with bench scraper or spatula. Decorate to your liking. I added texture to my frosting with an offset spatula and added a bottom border with a 1M piping tip, and topped with fresh strawberries.
• The cake should be stored in the refrigerator in an airtight container or under a cake dome, etc.
• ***Remove the cake from the refrigerator 2-3 hours before serving so that it has plenty of time to warm and soften. Cakes containing butter firm up when chilled and so they need time so soften before serving.

Notes

Substitution for Cake Flour: Using all purpose flour (plain in UK) to make Cake Flour: For each cup of flour in a recipe, remove 2 Tablespoons of flour and replace with 2 Tablespoons cornstarch (cornflour in the UK). This recipe has 3 cups of flour so you will measure out 3 cups of all purpose flour, remove 6 Tablespoons and replace with 6 Tablespoons cornstarch, whisk to blend

Substitution for Buttermilk: To make ¾ cup "buttermilk", add 1 Tablespoon vinegar or lemon juice to a measuring cup. Add milk to the ¾ cup mark.

Refrigeration: Because of the whipped cream filling, this cake should be refrigerated. Remove from the refrigerator about 2 hours before serving so that it has plenty of time to warm to room temperature for best texture and flavor.

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