Perfect Vanilla Cake


Cake, Cupcakes, Recipes / Sunday, January 20th, 2019

I have a favorite chocolate cake recipe that I use for almost all cake requirements. I’m thrilled when my kids ask for chocolate for their birthday cakes because I know I’ve got it covered. But vanilla? I wilt a little when they ask for that because the recipes I’ve tried before have fallen flat.

You mix up this cake totally backwards, and it WORKS. All the dry ingredients go into the bowl first and you mix in softened butter. (Can I tell you that the first time I made this I forgot to put the sugar in because it wasn’t listed with the dry ingredients—it was with the butter and eggs—so I totally missed it. When I tasted the batter after it was all whipped up and ready for the pan, it was AWFUL. I realized my mistake and tossed the sugar right in. Moral of the story: ALWAYS taste the batter before you bake.)

The cake is too dry or the texture too tough—nothing like the exquisite moist, soft perfection of my chocolate cake.

And then last week my sweet next-door neighbor asked for a vanilla cake for her birthday. Her *91st* birthday. And I knew—I just KNEW—I had to find the perfect recipe for her.

Dry ingredients, butter, and eggs. I should have mixed in the milk, yogurt, and vanilla before the eggs, but I did it backwards. Still worked out just fine.

Lucky for her, I’d just made these amazing maple muffins with oat streusel, but I’d baked it as a coffee cake and the cake was…gah! SO soft, SO moist, SO perfect. So I started wondering if maybe—MAYBE—I could turn the maple cake into a vanilla cake.

LOOK at that beautiful batter. When it finally pulled together like this, I was all WHEW, because for a few minutes there I wasn’t so sure about this reverse-creaming method.

A little research here and a little research there, some figuring on how to replace the maple syrup with sugar, and then a stumbling upon a new-to-me cake mixing method called the paste (or reverse-creaming) method. It was supposed to result in a moist, tender, denser crumb—a sturdy cake that slices with minimal crumbs.

Color me SOLD. I had to give it a try.

Batter this pretty HAD to turn into great cake, right? Not always true, sadly. But fortunately for me, this gorgeous batter turned into some seriously delicious vanilla cake.

 

Though, I was nervous. The cake HAD to be good. Not only for the sake of my sweet 91-year-old friend, but we were bringing it to her birthday dinner where there would be several other people. Talk about pressure! I did not want to bring a substandard sweet to the shindig.

The heavenly vanilla-y smell was pretty swoon worthy, I gotta tell you.

So I crossed all the things, made a butter sacrifice to the baking gods, said a few incantations, and jumped in.

I’m gonna be honest here. It was a REALLY strange way of mixing things. You put all the dry ingredients into your mixing bowl and mix in softened butter until it looks sandy. Then you add the milk and vanilla ingredients, then the eggs one at a time. Beat it for a couple of minutes on medium speed, and you end up with this amazing poufy, thick batter.

The Birthday Cake. Those chocolate sprinkles are not your run-of-the-mill grocery store, waxy, flavorless sprinkles. These babies are pure chocolate and are insanely, fabulously, melt-in-your-mouth delicious. They are Callebaut Vermicelli Dark*, and because they are pricey we use them sparingly in our house. They are SO worth it (but you’ll never be able to go back to regular sprinkles once you’ve had them).

And the cake? Melt-in-your-mouth tender, moist, and vanilla-y. The consensus around the birthday table was “It’s DELICIOUS.” Huzzah! (And WHEW.) Plus? The “several other people” planning to be at the birthday dinner turned into 18, so the cake was cut into 20 small slivers, and it sliced LIKE A DREAM. I have never had a cake slice so easily and cleanly. I *wish* I had pictures to show you.

The Verdict: A perfect vanilla cake.

Because I didn’t get any pictures of the sliced birthday cake, I had to make cupcakes so you could see the crumb. (I know, I know, poor us.) Also? I am not terribly talented at decorating cakes/cupcakes, but hey, they taste good, which is what REALLY matters.

 

CUPCAKE-EATING HACK: If you pull off the bottom and place it on top of the frosting, you get a cupcake sandwich that is easier to bite into without getting frosting all over your face. Plus, you taste frosting in every bite.

 

Perfect Vanilla Cake

Perfect Vanilla Cake

A tender, moist vanilla cake that slices like a dream.
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 35 minutes
Total Time: 50 minutes
Course: Dessert
Servings: 1 layer cake or 24 cupcakes

Ingredients

  • 3 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 cups sugar
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup butter, softened
  • 1 cup vanilla Greek yogurt
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla
  • 3 eggs

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 350 F/177 C. Prepare baking pan(s): grease and flour a 13 x 9 or two layer cake pans; place cupcake papers in two muffin pans.
  • Put all dry ingredients into the mixing bowl. Add the butter and mix well until the ingredients look sandy.
  • Add yogurt, milk, and vanilla into the dry ingredients and mix well. Then add eggs one at a time, until combined. Turn mixer on medium speed, and mix for 2 minutes.
  • Pour batter into prepared pan(s). Bake cakes for 30-35 minutes, cupcakes for 20-22 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean. Allow the cakes to cool completely before frosting.

Notes

Recipe based on and heavily adapted from Maple Muffins with Oat Streusel.

*The amazingly delicious chocolate sprinkles is an Amazon Affiliates link. Thanks! Please see the right sidebar for more information.

10 Replies to “Perfect Vanilla Cake”

    1. So sorry I didn’t see this when you posted! Belatedly, this is the fabulous chocolate frosting recipe I used: https://sugarspunrun.com/favorite-chocolate-frosting-recipe/. It was a *little* finicky—I ended up over-whipping it, so the frosting wasn’t smooth. Adding more cream fixed that right up. Alternatively, the chocolate frosting recipe Becky posted with Breezy’s Chocolate Birthday Cake is also amazingly light and delicious: https://www.flakybakers.com/2018/04/breezys-chocolate-chocolate-birthday-cake/.

    1. We haven’t tried an eggless version of this cake yet, but that’s definitely something we’ll look into. Thanks for the inspiration!

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