04.03.

2018 Red Velvet Cake | RecipeTin Eats

Red Velvet Cake 4.91 from 114 votes

Prep Time Cook Time Total Time

30 mins 25 mins 55 mins

The classic, iconic Red Velvet Cake! The sponge is soft and velvety, true to it's name,
with a buttery flavour, moist with a hint of chocolate, vanilla and tang from buttermilk.
The essential elements of this recipe are: cake flour (Note 1), buttermilk (no
substituting!), butter & buttermilk at room temperature. IMPORTANT: Don't mix cups
with grams/mls. So if you measure flour with cups, measure all the ingredients using
cups where specified. And if you use grams, only use the provided grams and mls, don't
use the cup measures. Recipe VIDEO below.

Course: Sweet Baking

Cuisine: American, Western
Servings: 10 -12
Author: Nagi | RecipeTin Eats

Ingredients
Dry Ingredients
2 2/3 cups / 400 g plain cake flour (Note 1)
2 tbsp / 10g cocoa powder, unsweetened
1 tsp / 5g baking soda / bi-carb soda, , NOT baking powder (Note 2)
Pinch of salt
Wet Ingredients
1/2 cup / 115 g unsalted butter, softened (1 US stick)
1 1/2 cups / 330 g caster / superfine white sugar (Note 3)
2 eggs, at room temperature (around 2 oz / 60g each)
1 cup / 250ml vegetable oil
1 tsp white vinegar
2 tsp vanilla extract (or essence)
1 cup / 250 ml buttermilk, at room temperature (Note 4)
2 1/2 tbsp red food colouring liquid (UK: use Gel, Note 7)
Frosting
14 oz/ 400g Philadelphia Cream Cheese, block (not spreadable tub, UK see Note 9)
1 stick / 1/2 cup / 115g unsalted butter at room temperature
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
4 cups / 450 g soft icing sugar / powdered sugar sifted

Instructions
1. Preheat oven to 180C/350F (all oven types). Butter 2 x 21cm / 8" round cake pans (sides and base) and dust
with cocoa powder.
2. Sift the Dry Ingredients and whisk to combine in a bowl.
3. Place butter and sugar in a bowl and beat with electric beater or in stand mixer until smooth and well
combined (use paddle attachment if using stand mixer).
4. Add eggs, one at a time, beating in between to combine. At first it will look curdle - keep beating until it's
smooth.
5. Add vegetable oil, vinegar, vanilla, buttermilk and red food colouring. Beat until combined and smooth (Note
5).
6. Add Dry Ingredients. Beat until just combined - some small lumps is ok, that's better than over mixing.
7. Divide batter between cake pans. Bake for 25 - 30 minutes on the same shelf, or until a toothpick inserted
into the centre comes out clean. (Note 6)
8. Rest for 10 minutes in the pan then turn out onto a cooling rack and allow to cool.
Frosting
1. Beat together cream cheese, butter and vanilla for 3 minutes (this makes it really smooth and changes from
yellow to almost white). Add icing sugar and beat for 2 minutes or until frosting is light and fluffy to your
taste. If your frosting seems too runny (depends on quality of cream cheese/ if the cream cheese was too
soft), just add more icing sugar.

https://www.recipetineats.com/red-velvet-cake/ 1/2
04.03.2018 Red Velvet Cake | RecipeTin Eats

Frost Cake
1. Cut the top off the cake using a serrated knife (to make the layers neat).
2. Spread one cake with 1 1/2 cups of frosting. Top with the other cake. Spread top and sides with remaining
frosting.
3. Optional: Crumble offcuts and use to decorate the top rim and base of the cake.

Recipe Notes
1. Cake flour is lighter and has a lower protein content that all purpose / plain flour. It produces cakes with a very
soft crumble and minimal "bounciness", like what you get from posh bakeries.

It is not readily available in all countries, though it can be found in Australia in supermarkets (Coles, Woolworths).

SUBSTITUTION - If you can't find cake flour, substitute as follows: Measure out 2 2/3 cups / 400 g plain (all
purpose) flour into a bowl. Remove 5 tbsp / 60g plain flour, then add 5 tbsp / 60g of cornstarch / cornflour.

CAN'T USE CAKE FLOUR? This recipe will work just fine if you make this with just all purpose / plain flour. The cake
just won't be quite as tender. :-) Still delicious though!

2. Baking Soda is also called bi-carb soda. It works like baking powder but it is 3 times stronger. It needs acid to
activate it (buttermilk in this recipe). It cannot be substituted with baking powder in this recipe.

3. Normal white sugar will also work just fine, it is just that caster sugar blends in easier, faster and better. :-)

4. Buttermilk - for most baking recipes, buttermilk can be substituted with milk + lemon juice left to curdle. But for
this recipe, it does not work as well so please use buttermilk!

5. Don't worry if it separates slightly because of the oil, it will come together when the flour is added.

6. CAKE SIZE: This can be made in one cake pan (but 2 cake pans is better/easier). Just pour batter into one cake
pan and bake for around 45 minutes in total, maybe even 1 hour, but you must cover with FOIL at around 30
minutes, otherwise the top may get too brown. Use a skewer to test if the inside is baked. Then cut cake in half.

CUPCAKES: This makes 22 standard cupcakes. Divide between paper patty lined muffin tins.

7. If you are in the UK, please use GEL not liquid food colouring. The liquid colouring sold there tends to be natural
rather than artificial so it is not as intense as the liquid colouring we have here in Australia and the US. So to
achieve the intense bright red colour, you will need to use gel.

8. OIL SPLITTING: A few readers had a problem where the base of the cake was oily once removed from the pan.
The steps in the recipe to ensure this does not happen are: ensuring the batter is beaten until smooth after adding
eggs, then again after adding oil (batter initially looks split, but keep beating and it comes together), and ensuring
the butter is extremely soft, bordering on melted. If the butter is too soft, then what happens is that it melts while
making the batter, rather than creaming, and this "leaks" while baking. This can happen with any cake that is made
with creamed butter.

9. Philadelphia Cream Cheese in the UK is softer than what we have here in Australia (and in the US, Canada). In
the UK, it has a lower fat % and comes in tubs, and it's spreadable. We also have Philly that comes in tubs that are
specifically made to be spreadable. This recipe calls for our Philadelphia cream cheese that comes in blocks and is
firmer. If you are in the UK, get 2 x 180g Original Philadelphia cream cheese and start with just 250g instead of the
400g called for in the recipe. After beating, if your frosting consistency is soft / fluffy but still holds its shape, add
more (for more cream cheese flavour). Also, ensure your butter is softened but NOT super soft, that will also help.
And don't worry, even if you used 250g, the frosting still tastes like cream cheese frosting!

Another great recipe by www.recipetineats.com

https://www.recipetineats.com/red-velvet-cake/ 2/2