Perfect, Easy Vanilla Cake
In this post, I’m going to toot my own horn. A lot.
Thank you to the amazing Christina Keddie, who took the photos of the cake!
The recipe
Yield: one 9 x 13 cake, 15 servings
Time: 1 and 1/2 hours
Ingredients
Cake:
1 Duncan Hines Perfectly Moist Classic Yellow cake mix
1 vanilla instant pudding mix (3.4 oz/96 g)
1 tbsp (15 g) vanilla extract
4 large eggs
½ c (80 g) vegetable oil
½ stick (4 tbsp or 57 g) salted butter
1 c (260 g) milk
Frosting:
2 sticks (1 c or 226 g) salted butter, at room temperature
1 c (230 g) granulated sugar
1 tbsp (15 g) vanilla extract
½ c (130 g) milk
3 tbsp (20 g) powdered sugar
Instructions
Cake:
1. Preheat your oven to 350°F. Prep your pan by greasing the bottom and sides with vegetable oil or butter.
2. Put the cake mix, pudding mix, vanilla extract, and eggs into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment.
3. Put the oil in a separate bowl. Melt the butter completely in the microwave. (It’s fine if it gets hot.) Add it to the bowl with the oil.
4. Heat the milk in the microwave until warm, then add it to the oil/butter mixture and stir well.
5. Pour the oil mixture into the bowl of the mixer and stir on low speed until combined. Scrape down the bottom and sides of the bowl, then increase the speed to medium and mix for 2 minutes.
6. After the batter is done mixing, pour it into the pan and smooth it out with a spatula. Bake for 25–28 minutes, until the center springs back when lightly pressed and a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cake comes out with a few cooked crumbs clinging to it.
7. Set the cake aside to cool.
Frosting:
1. Beat the butter in a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment until soft. Add the sugar and vanilla and beat again until light and fluffy.
2. Warm the milk in the microwave until it is about room temperature. Add it a little at a time to the sugar and butter mixture, beating to incorporate each addition before adding the next, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
3. Add the powdered sugar and mix to combine. Turn the mixer to high speed and beat for 5–10 minutes, until the sugar is dissolved and the frosting tastes smooth instead of grainy.
4. Once the cake is cool, frost and enjoy! The cake keeps for a few days, covered, at room temperature.
Notes and tips
I tried all the cake mixes when testing this recipe, and just like my mom always says, the Duncan Hines Classic Yellow is the best. The Duncan Hines Classic White mix is a good substitute.
For the cake, you can use a cheap or imitation vanilla extract. Because it’s baked, it won’t make a difference. Check out this YouTube video for the science explaining why! However, use the best vanilla extract you can get your hands on for the frosting. You can really taste the difference there.
You need to warm the milk for the cake so that the melted butter doesn’t solidify into small chunks when it hits the cold eggs.
The salted butter is important in this frosting. It doesn’t taste the same if you use unsalted butter and add some salt to it because the salt may not dissolve.
The vanilla goes in the frosting when creaming the butter and the sugar to give you better flavor. When it dissolves into the fat, the vanilla flavor is more intense.
Warming the milk a little for the frosting helps prevent it from curdling. The frosting is an emulsion, and emulsions work best if all their ingredients are at the same temperature.
If the frosting curdles or separates a little when the last of the milk goes in, don’t worry. It should come right back together when you add the powdered sugar and beat it. If it doesn’t, add one extra tablespoon of powdered sugar and beat it on high until it becomes smooth again (this could take a full five minutes; be patient).
The story
“Marry her. Immediately,” my now-husband’s friends told him after I baked them cupcakes with this frosting. It’s not just them; every time my mom and I take a cake somewhere, people swarm us. “I didn’t know frosting could be this light and fluffy,” they say. “It isn’t cloyingly sweet like a buttercream.” “I usually scrape the frosting off my cake but I actually liked it this time!” They always end with, “Can I have the recipe?” And my mom and I always say, “No!” It’s an insurance policy. Our friends can’t leave us if we’re their only source of legendary cake. Neither can our husbands.
The original frosting is a family secret, passed down from my grandmother to my mother and from my mom to me. I love it, but my recipe developer brain won’t let me leave well enough alone. I get to wondering what would happen if I tried more salted butter, or if I added the vanilla extract at a different stage in the process. So I tweaked this recipe, and I tweaked it, and tweaked it some more, and I have the gall (and the pride) to think that the version I’ve published here is better than the original. I don’t always trust my own judgment, not when it comes to navigating relationships, and you can have me questioning my political beliefs with a single confident assertion—but when it comes to baked goods? I know exactly what I’m talking about.
So when I say this frosting is perfect, I mean it. It is not too sweet, incredibly silky and smooth, intensely vanilla flavored, and head and shoulders better than any buttercream out there. It is similar to an ermine frosting in taste and texture, but faster and easier, requiring no stovetop cooking and no waiting for a hot mixture to cool. You simply throw the ingredients into a mixer and let it go.
The cake is even better than the frosting, and it’s my crowning glory. It has a wonderful buttery flavor and an incredibly light, soft texture; the best parts of a butter and an oil cake all in one. It’s easy, too. All you do is melt the butter, combine it with the wet ingredients, throw everything in the bowl of a stand mixer, pop the pan in the oven, and the whole cake is done in just over half an hour. It’s perfect for beginners, so if you’re looking for an easy recipe to try, start here!
Spread the snob
If you like this recipe, please recommend Confessions of a Cake Snob to someone you know! Follow me on Pinterest or Instagram for more ways to view and save the recipes. Please share this newsletter with a friend, comment on the website, or bake it and let me know how it went for you! Email me with comments, ideas, and suggestions at confessionsofacakesnob@substack.com.
This recipe is amazing! I made it for a friend’s birthday and it was a hit. Easy to follow even for a novice baker like myself :)