I Love You Strawberry Cake for #VanillaWeek

I’ve realized that there are people out there who prefer vanilla cake over chocolate. It took me a while to comprehend what this actually meant. I seriously can’t imagine anyone not liking chocolate or wanting vanilla cake anything over chocolate. But my husband is one of these people.

And, with this cake, I get it.

I guess you can’t have chocolate cake all the time right?

With Valentine’s Day coming up, I decided to bake a strawberry cake for my husband! You guys, I loved this cake! The texture is perfect and the cake is subtly sweet and perfectly moist and filled with fresh strawberries. And the vanilla buttercream just ties everything together. I ate like two huge slices all by myself. And I attempted my first naked cake! Or semi naked “rustic” cake.

I always run my photos by my sister, Grace. And after showing her some of these, she told me I needed to finish frosting my cake. .  she had never seen the rustic looking cakes before. And so after explaining what I was trying to do, she was like, “Oh so this is like a distressed barn look?” You should style it with barn accents!” I got a very good chuckle out of that comment.

So, after I frosted my distressed strawberry cake, it took forever for me to decide how I was going to style this cake. So, I shot it a few different ways.

She’s such a pretty girl (yes, my cake is a girl), she needed a little bonnet.

But then I played around with strawberries on top. And if you look closely, the strawberries kind of look like a heart.

These three ingredients make this cake. Especially

So, say I love you this Valentine’s Day with this strawberry cake. You will love it!

Print Recipe

I Love You Strawberry Cake

Recipe makes three 6 inch round cakes. And for the top tier, I cut it into a smaller round cake. *I highly recommend the cakes being really cold or even halfway frozen when frosting it. I always bake my cakes a day earlier, freeze them and then assemble the cake after the cakes have been out of the freezer for like 30 minutes. I feel that this helps when working with and frosting the cake.

Prep Time10 minutes mins

Cook Time35 minutes mins

Total Time45 minutes mins

Course: Dessert

Author: Hip Foodie Mom

Ingredients

For the cake:

• 1 cup 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temp
• 1 ½ cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 2 ½ cups cake flour
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 ½ teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 cups fresh strawberries diced + more for decoration if desired

For the buttercream frosting:

• 1 cup 2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temp
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• pinch of salt
• 6 cups of powdered sugar
• 1/4 cup whole milk plus more if needed

Instructions

For the cake:

• Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and prep your 6 inch cake pans by lining them with parchment paper on the bottom and spraying with non-stick baking spray.
• Using your stand mixer fitted with the flat beater attachment, mix together the butter until smooth. Add in the sugar and mix again. Add in the eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition. Add in the milk and the vanilla and mix one more time.
• In a separate mixing bowl, stir together the cake flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda. With the stand mixer on a low setting, slowly pour in the dry flour mixture into the wet ingredients until just combined. Add in the fresh diced strawberries and mix together one more time.
• Evenly distribute the cake batter into all three cake pans and bake for about 30 to 35 minutes, or until a tester inserted comes out clean. Let the cakes cool completely before removing from the cake pans. *See my note above regarding freezing the cakes.

For the buttercream frosting:

• Using your stand mixer fitted with the flat beater attachment, beat together the butter until smooth and add in the vanilla and salt and mix again. Add in the powdered sugar, about a cup at a time, while also alternating and pouring in the milk, just a little at a time until you have a buttercream that you are happy with. I'm usually good with about 6 cups of powdered sugar but feel free to use more or less depending on your taste preference.

To assemble:

• At this point, you can cut one cake layer into a smaller round cake. I just eye balled it and cut. Frost the bottom cake layer with some buttercream frosting and top with the second cake layer. Frost the top of the second layer and top with the third layer. Frost the top of the third layer and using an offset spatula, apply some frosting (you can either use a lot or start with a little) all around the cake. If wanting to do the naked "rustic" cake look, use your offset spatula to then remove some of the frosting, exposing some of the cake. The frosting recipe makes enough frosting to frost the entire cake. So, if you do this rustic cake look, you will have leftover frosting.

I’m joining some friends this week and we’re celebrating vanilla  . . and we’re kicking it off today! So, check out all of the other fabulous recipes today using vanilla and enter the giveaway below! And check back here all week for some great posts!

Vanilla Week!! 

Hello and welcome to #VanillaWeek hosted by Terri from

Disclosure: This is not a sponsored post. The giveaway is sponsored by Nielsen-Massey, Bob’s Red Mill, Silpat, Quirk Books and Dixie Crystals/Imperial Sugar. Nielsen-Massey products can be purchased at Williams-Sonoma. All Nielsen-Massey products are gluten-free, allergen-free, GMO-free and Kosher.