Perfect for any occasion, this Southern Triple-layer Strawberry Cake (made from scratch – no boxed cake mix!) is a moist, amazingly delicious cake with a fresh, bright strawberry buttercream frosting.
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For me, baking is often about memories. Sometimes I bake memories for people I love: pineapple-upside down cake when we go camping, peach cobbler in August, pumpkin pie for my mother’s birthday. Other times, baking is a path that takes me back in time.
Recently, Mr B and I traveled to Tennessee, where we had the honor of attending the Change of Command and Retirement Ceremony for one of his best friends from his Navy days.
If you’ve never attended the retirement rites of a senior military officer, I highly recommend it. It may very well renew (or redeem) your faith in both our country and the people who protect it. (And if the flag passing ceremony of Olde Glory doesn’t move you to tears, I don’t know what will.)
After the formal ceremonies concluded, we were ushered into a reception room filled with sailors decked out in their full dress whites, along with families and friends. My eyes roamed from one small cluster to the next; to the smiling faces, the convivial conversations, the warm embraces.
In the middle of the reception room was a long refreshment table with two large, beautifully decorated cakes on either end. Centered between them sat a modest, unpretentious pale pink layer cake.
A memory flickered.
That pink cake. My mother always told me that Southerners love their cakes. I plated a small piece and took a bite.
In an instant, I was four…maybe five, sitting on my stool at my Pop’s yellow chrome and formica kitchen table. I don’t know the occasion, but I remember that cake. Smooth, sweet, pink, and perfectly strawberry.
It tasted like summer.
Standing in that reception room in Tennessee, I had not tasted strawberry cake in fifty years, but as that single bite melted on my tongue, it was yesterday.
When Mr B and I returned home to Oregon, I set about baking myself a memory.
Building a Perfect Strawberry Cake Recipe
Perfecting a recipe for a Strawberry Cake from scratch wasn’t easy. Nearly every recipe source I could find required a boxed cake mix, and I was intent on baking a cake *from scratch.*
In my quest, I consulted at least fifteen different recipes, cookbooks, and bakers’ websites before I finally felt confident about my game plan. However, once I got the ratios for everything right (the sugar levels were especially tricky) and recognized that those whipped egg whites make all the difference, it all fell into place.
I couldn’t be happier with the outcome!
This strawberry scratch cake is far and away easier to make than you might imagine; and in my opinion, working with the triple layers is easier than two thicker layers. My recipe for Strawberry Cake from scratch results in a moist, amazingly delicious cake with a fresh strawberry buttercream frosting. You are going to love it!!!
Frosting Philosophy
There are two basic schools of thought about frosting: (1) the cake is a necessary conveyance for getting as much frosting as possible into your mouth; and (2) the cake is the star, and frosting is, well… frosting. It is for sealing the cake and adding additional texture and sweetness, but don’t go all crazy and let it overpower the cake.
I belong to the second, “less-is-more” group. You may notice that, in the images here, there is only enough frosting between the layers to hold them together, and that the outer frosting isn’t spread on very heavily. For my tastes, this amount of frosting provides the perfect balance for this cake.
If, however, you lean toward the first, “the-more-frosting-the-better” group, be assured that you will not run short of strawberry frosting with this recipe. I had well over a cup leftover when this cake was done. (Hello, late-night frosting-n-graham-crackers!)
Triple-layer Strawberry Cake with Fresh Strawberry Buttercream Frosting
Ingredients
Strawberry Puree
- 8 ounces fresh hulled strawberries
- 2 tablespoons white sugar
Strawberry Cake
- 4 egg whites room temperature
- 2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour VERY Important: Sift, THEN measure.
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 1 3/8 cups white sugar
- 1 3-ounce pkg Strawberry flavored Jell-O®
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 3 egg yolks
- 1 cup milk 2% or whole
- 1/2 cup fresh strawberry puree
- 1 teaspoon fresh lemon zest
- 1 tablespoon vanilla
Strawberry Frosting
- 6 cups powdered sugar
- 1 1/2 cups unsalted butter room temperature
- 1/3 cup strawberry puree
- 1 tablespoon strawberry jam or 1/2 tsp. strawberry extract
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
Make Strawberry Puree
- Combine fresh strawberries and two tablespoons of sugar in a blender. Pulse until strawberries are reduced to a pulp. DO NOT blend until smooth. (You will use 1/2 cup of the puree for the cake. Reserve the remaining puree to use in the frosting.) Set aside and allow to macerate further while you perform next few steps.
Make the Cake Layers
- Preheat oven to 350°F [175°C]. Grease and flour three 9-inch round cake pans.
- Whip eggs whites until they form medium peaks. Set aside.
- Combine sifted flour and baking powder. Set aside.
- Whisk together milk, strawberry puree, lemon zest, and vanilla. Set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter, sugar, dry strawberry Jell-O®, and salt. Beat in eggs yolks one at a time.
- Stir flour mixture into batter alternately with strawberry-milk mixture.
- Gently fold in whipped egg whites.
- Pour batter evenly into the three prepared cake pans. Bake in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick or skewer comes out clean.
- Allow cakes to cool in their pans over wire rack for at least 10 minutes. Carefully tap out onto wire rack to cool completely.
Make Strawberry Frosting
- Using an electric mixer, beat butter on medium-high until light and fluffy.
- With mixer on low, add powdered sugar to the whipped butter alternately with 1/3 cup pureed strawberries. Combine thoroughly into a soft, creamy mixture that will hold its shape. Cool in the refrigerator for 10 minutes, or until it has firmed up slightly.
Assemble the Cake
- Spread the top of the bottom layer of cake with frosting. Add the middle layer and refrigerate again until the frosting has firmed up a bit. Add the top layer and frost sides and top of cake. For a cleaner frosting, apply a crumb coat first to keep the crumbs out of your final frosting. If you are spreading the frosting on thick, you may want to refrigerate the cake after you apply the frosting between each layer until the frosting has firmed just a bit; about 10-15 minutes for each layer. (If you are frosting it thin, you probably won't need to do this.)
- Decorate with fresh strawberries if desired.
Notes
Nutrition
This website provides approximate nutrition information for convenience and as a courtesy only. You are solely responsible for ensuring that any nutritional information provided is accurate, complete, and useful.
Cakes are Persnickety, and Ingredients Matter
Flour: It’s important to use cake flour for this cake. Cake flour is a finely milled, delicate flour that results in a fine crumb and a good rise.
The primary difference between cake flour and all-purpose flour [AP] is that cake flour has slightly less protein, which translates to less gluten in your cake, which means you will have a more tender cake. My personal cake flour preference is Bob’s Red Mill Super Fine Cake Flour.
I cannot stress this enough: when it comes to flour in baking, sift first, THEN measure.
Jell-O®: Y’all know that I try to avoid the boxes, but this recipe just doesn’t fly without Jell-O®. If possible, avoid using off-brand gelatin: the strawberry flavor in them usually tastes like cheap kids’ candy.
Strawberries: Fresh and frozen will both work.
Egg White Whipping Stages
- Soft peaks barely hold their shape, and flop over as soon as the beaters are lifted.
- Medium peaks can hold their shape, but the peak curls over when the beaters are lifted.
- Stiff peaks stand straight up when the beaters are lifted.
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P.S. Did I mention how much I LOVE LOVE LOVE my new cake pans!?! I finally took the plunge and bought three – count ’em: 3 – matching 9″ cake pans. As in, they are all the same size, shape, and weight! As in, I can put them all in the oven at the same time and take them out at the same time because they all bake evenly!! Aaahh!
I was so excited to get my new pans that I completely cleaned out my baking shelf so that they would have a cozy new place to hang out when they aren’t in use. (For those of you who regularly bake a lot of cakes, this might sound ridiculous, but this is the first time in my life that I’ve ever had more than two cake pans that match exactly, and I am going to celebrate it! Whoohoo!)
If you are thinking of buying a new set of cake pans, check these out; they are the ones I have now.
I’m sharing this recipe on the Weekend Potluck Recipe Linkup. Check it out for more great recipes!
Beautiful cake. I love using Jello in cake recipes. It really boosts the flavor. I will never know if it works to freeze…it won’t last long enough for that at my house!
Oh man, I would love a big slice of this right now to go with my coffee this morning! Strawberry cake is a must for everyone’s recipe box…thanks for sharing!
i would love to make this for my son. how long can this cake set up if I make it on a Friday or Saturday for Sunday? does it have to be refrigerated?
This particular cake seems to last a pretty long time, so I think you’d be safe making it as early as Friday and still be good for Sunday, and as long as you cover it well to keep the frosting from hardening, it should be fine out of the fridge as long as its kept somewhere cool and dry. (If it gets too warm, you’ll run the risk of that butter-based frosting slipping.)
We’ve eaten this cake up to five days after it was made, and it still tastes great; maybe not quite as “light” in the sponge-cake sense, but just as delicious – just fractionally denser, if that makes sense. Also coincidentally, just last weekend, we took a six-month old quarter-cake out of the freezer, and we were very pleasantly surprised at how fresh-tasting and well-preserved it was.
Can I use bread flour or all purpose flou r?
I imagine that you can use all-purpose flour, although I’ve never done it myself. Your cake won’t be as light, but I think it would ok. DO NOT, under any circumstances, use bread flour – you will just end up with a baked brick.
I love that this cake is made with fresh strawberries. It looks really tasty!
I love strawberry cake! Your version looks so light and fluffy — just perfect. Can’t wait to give this a try!
I have been to a similar ceremony and I agree- they’re something incredibly special about being a part of those. As for your cake, that looks so good! And I love the naturally pink color that comes from the strawberries!
Lovely cake! I like that you used fresh strawberries to get that natural pink coloring in the frosting.
Thank you, Maryanne. The color in the frosting is 100% natural. The color in the cake comes from a combination of fresh strawberries and Jell-O. (I couldn’t get it to work without it.)
“Baking a memory” — what a beautiful turn of phrase to express the way taste can transport us in time. It doesn’t hurt that the cake turned out to be gorgeous!
Thanks, Catherine. From one word person to another, that means a lot. ?
Gorgeous cake! The color from the fresh strawberries is so pretty, and baking from scratch is so much better than using boxed cake mix. Also, love the idea of baking a memory. What a lovely thought!
Thank you so much!
I LOVE strawberry cake. It has always been a favorite for some strange reason. Well, not so strange, really. It really is delicious.
Me too, Amanda. I think it’s more unique than strange ?
Thank you for sharing! My mom LOVES strawberry cake and we’re always looking for a good classic strawberry cake recipe from scratch. Will definitely be printing this one off for the recipe box.
What a pretty cake, and I love the sweet colors and the lovely story about the inspiration from the near past and farther past. It is so nostalgic and classic!
This cake looks perfect! I really the presentation!
The cake looks beautiful! I’ve never put too much thought into how much my baking habits resonate with memories growing up!
That color is spectacular! I don’t think anything beats a good pink dessert and this looks absolutely tasty. I love that it utilized fresh strawberries too!
YES YES YES!!! When strawberries are back in season this is the first thing I will whip up!!!
I absolutely love and truly appreciate your joyful enthusiasm, Leah!! ?
What a beautiful cake! I’m with you on the frosting. I don’t like to go overboard. I like a nice balance so you can equally taste the cake with just enough frosting.
This strawberry cake looks and sounds delicious, I will definitely have to try it for the family, thanks for sharing!
~xo Sheree
poshclassymom.com
What a gorgeous color you got on the cake! And fresh strawberries are so yummy in cakes, I bet this is too!
Wow, thank you for the recipe! It looks so delicious. I will try to make this cake tomorrow!
This looks so delicious! I have a birthday party to go to this weekend and was thinking I may make this cake!
Even from the freezer, this cake is amazing. We had some leftover that we froze and I decided to pull it out yesterday after being in there since August. I loved it!
Great! Thank you so much. I can’t wait to try it.
Hello, can I make this in a 9×12 pan
I’ve only made it as a layer cake, so I don’t know how it would fit in a 9×12, but it should work fine. You’ll need to increase the baking time, of course.
how long can the icing be kept
The frosting is butter-based, so about a month in the fridge, or 6-9 months in the freezer. We had this cake from the freezer just last week: it had been there 7 months and it tasted delicious.
Great! I made it on Saturday and I had a lot of icing leftover and didn’t want it to go to waste. The cake was great and my family enjoyed it especially my son as he is a cray about anything strawberry. I just wished the layers were a little bit bigger. I had one more question. I don’t have a 3/8 measuring cup which I figured it out, but is there a easier way to figure out 3/8 cup?
I’m so glad it turned out so well for you! You can make the layers thicker/deeper by using 8-inch round pans instead of 9-inch, in which case you would need to increase the baking time by 5-6 minutes. And 3/8 cup = 1/4 cup + 2 Tbls = 6 Tbls. ☺️
Just made this cake for my son’s 18th birthday. I made a few changes. I slightly increased the amount of strawberry puree and left out the jello. I found an increase in puree adds a beautiful pink color without the artificial and adds a wonderful strawberry taste as well. I did discover that by the time I added the egg whites, they’d be better off being whisked before adding them to the batter. They tend to slightly break down while sitting aside in a bowl. My son took a taste of the batter from the mixing bowl (after I poured into the pans) and he loves it!
Thanks for your feedback! I’m so glad you liked the cake. Yes, as the directions indicate, it is VERY important to have the batter ready BEFORE you whip the egg whites. I have made it both with and without the Jello, and I personally like the extra flavor with it, but I’m glad it worked for you without it. Great for people trying to avoid coloring, etc. ?
Is this cake moist and not thick in texture?
Thanks
Yes, the cake is very moist. The thickness is determined by the number and size of the pans you use. If you make it as shown, each layer turns out to be about 1-inch thick.
Can I make this recipe into cupcakes? This cakes is delicious!!! I have made it many times and folks rave about it!
I’m so glad you like the recipe, Callie! Of course you can make it into cupcakes. I haven’t tried doing that with this recipe yet, but generally, when you convert a cake recipe to cupcakes, you keep the oven temperature the same and reduce the oven time. In this case, I’d probably start with 15 minutes, test for doneness, and go from there. Please come back and let me know how they turn out! ?
Do you need to let the strawberries thaw before you make the purée? I was worried the extra water might throw off the recipe
No. The water released by frozen berries is the same water you would have inside the berries if they were fresh. They do, however, need to be thawed enough to break down in the blender.
Hi, I am looking for a gluten free version. Have you experimented with replacing the flour? Thanks!
I have not tried gluten-free flour with this cake yet. However, if you do, please come back and let us know how it turned out. (My SIL is GF, and this cake would make her so happy!)
Hi,should that be a 3 oz packet of jello? Cheers x
Yes; the recipe lists one 3-ounce package.
Hi your cake looks good and I’m ready to try it for a birthday cake could I use a regular and half recipe to make the cake bigger your thoughts greatly appreciatef