Our Classic White Cake Will Convert Even Die-Hard Chocolate Lovers

Delish

This classic white cake is moist, soft, and fluffy and is topped with a silky vanilla frosting. Follow our pro tips to make sure your cake is the best ever.

Transcript

00:00Hey everybody, it's Justin here

00:01in the Delish Kitchen studios.

00:03I am genuinely kind of just like a piece of New Jersey trash

00:08and as such, I like trashy things,

00:10specifically trashy desserts, cosmic brownies,

00:13the bottom of a Tate's cookie bag

00:15where it's just the crumbles.

00:17But sometimes I do wanna be a little elegant

00:19and this dessert is definitely elegant baby.

00:23A white cake that is beautiful.

00:26It has like a little delicate white crumb

00:28and a really luxurious buttercream.

00:31It is a little bit out of my comfort zone

00:34but I do like to go off sometimes

00:36and we're gonna do it together.

00:37Let's do it.

00:38With any baked good or cake,

00:39it's always going to start with creaming

00:42two of the staples of the American sweets diet.

00:44That's gonna be butter and sugar baby.

00:46So into the bowl of a stand mixer with the whisk attachment

00:50or with a hand mixer,

00:51I'm going to be adding two sticks of butter and some sugar.

00:55Then we're gonna let it rip baby.

00:56It's gonna go for like three, four minutes

00:58just until it's nice and light and fluffy.

01:00Then I'm gonna add a little bit of vegetable oil,

01:02mix that until just combined.

01:04All right, this is looking well creamed

01:07and now we can go in with more ingredients.

01:09If you're thinking, what is a white cake?

01:12Let me tell you.

01:13Cause obviously you've heard of like vanilla cake

01:14but usually what comes to mind is that like bright yellow,

01:17delicious cake that I happen to love.

01:19The key difference between these two,

01:20this is still flavored with vanilla

01:22but a couple of things that are gonna be different.

01:24One, we're gonna be using only egg whites

01:26instead of egg yolks.

01:28The thing that gives cake like normal egg cake,

01:31that golden color is the yolk.

01:32So by adding only whites,

01:34we're keeping these a little bit lighter

01:36and we're also not adding in the yolk

01:38that will change the color.

01:39In addition, we're gonna be using vanilla extract

01:41and almond extract but we don't want to color our cake

01:44to make it darker

01:45cause those things are naturally usually brown.

01:47So we're gonna be using clear extract.

01:49So it's just both vanilla and almond

01:51cause I fricking love almond extract

01:53but they're gonna be clear

01:54and that won't color our batter as well.

01:56Go ahead and add your egg whites

01:58while the machine is running in three additions.

02:01Then we're gonna add our vanilla extract

02:03and our almond extract.

02:04The next secret and the next ingredient

02:06to this cake is sour cream.

02:09Egg yolks bring a lot of like richness and fat to our cake.

02:13So this is going to sort of replace that

02:16and add some rich creaminess

02:17as well as like a very subtle tang

02:20that you're gonna taste like very subtly,

02:22basically just detected the back of your mouth

02:24while you're eating it.

02:25That mixed up really well together

02:27and I forgot to mention this earlier,

02:29all of your ingredients should be room temperature.

02:31That is like a huge key to making a really cohesive,

02:34really amazing cake batter

02:36is making sure that not just the butter

02:38which needs to cream but like things like eggs,

02:40things like sour cream and milk

02:42should all be room temperature.

02:44Now we're gonna mix in all of our dry ingredients

02:46and you might be thinking that

02:47why would we have to whisk them all together

02:49before they go into a high powered beater?

02:51That's because it really just does help

02:53incorporate those things together

02:54and make sure that the leaveners are well distributed.

02:57So into our bowl of all purpose flour,

02:59we're going to be adding baking soda,

03:02baking powder and a little bit of kosher salt.

03:04Whisk that up nice, nice

03:06and then we're gonna add about half of that

03:08into our mixer, whisk that up until it's nice and combined.

03:11Then we're gonna add some room temperature milk

03:14and then finally go in with the remaining

03:15half of our dry ingredients,

03:17making sure to not over beat it

03:18and just getting all the dry streaks out,

03:20no lumpy clumpies and then that will be our batter made.

03:25This is our beautiful white cake batter.

03:28It really does like, it's kind of eerie

03:30to see a cake batter that's just white.

03:32Honestly, when I've made this in the past,

03:34I've felt that way because you're so used

03:36to seeing that beautiful golden cake

03:37but that doesn't mean that this isn't delicious.

03:38In fact, this is very delicious.

03:40So we're going to get it into our cake pans.

03:42We have three matching eight inch cake pans.

03:45I'm gonna go ahead and grease it.

03:47You can grease it however you want

03:50and we also have some parchment rounds

03:53that we're gonna place in here.

03:55That's gonna be for easy removal once we are baked.

03:58We're gonna go into each pan with equal amounts of batter.

04:02You can be crazy like me and get a scale

04:04and measure out exactly how much

04:06or you can just eyeball it if you want something

04:07a little bit more rustico or a little bit more

04:10just like relying on your volume awareness.

04:14Then you can just use your spat or an offset,

04:16smooth it out on top and we'll get ready to bake.

04:19Our cakes look beautiful and they're perfectly portioned

04:22so they're gonna go into a 350 degree oven

04:25for 25 to 30-ish minutes,

04:28basically just until you put a toothpick in

04:30and it comes out dry and you wanna be watching

04:33because that can happen quickly

04:34and you wanna take it out as soon as that happens.

04:36All right, watch your cakes.

04:38The frosting for this cake

04:39is a simple American buttercream.

04:41I can almost guarantee you've made this at home

04:43and if you haven't, it's super easy.

04:45To the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment

04:48or in a big bowl with a hand mixer,

04:49we're gonna add a bunch of sticks of very softened butter.

04:52That's the key here.

04:52That's what's gonna make a difference

04:53in making it easier to make.

04:55Then we're gonna start beating that

04:56for like 30 seconds to a minute

04:59until it's nice and fluffy.

05:01And then we're gonna gradually start adding in

05:02a bunch of confectioner's sugar.

05:04This is the bulk of our frosting.

05:07We're gonna keep adding and adding and adding

05:09until it is all incorporated.

05:11Then we're gonna add the cream,

05:13a bit of clear vanilla extract like from before

05:15and some salt.

05:16Beat that all together.

05:17If you still feel that your frosting

05:18is maybe a little thick,

05:19you can add a little bit more cream

05:21but this is looking good to me.

05:22It's me, DJ Cake Maker.

05:26Ay!

05:27I hated it.

05:28I hated it as soon as I did it.

05:29Okay, we're gonna get started decorating our cake.

05:31I'd say having a rotating cake stand

05:33if you wanna be a serious cake decorator

05:36is almost necessary.

05:37It's not totally necessary

05:39but it really does help you out,

05:40especially for someone who's like,

05:41doesn't do it as often as others.

05:43Something I will do after I've trimmed the cakes,

05:45I will pick out the plate that I wanna serve the cake on

05:48and put it on my rotating cake stand.

05:50This means I don't have to worry about

05:51transferring it and everything

05:53and if it doesn't have a super high rim,

05:55it should be easy to decorate like this.

05:58So, first thing we're gonna do,

06:00any good cake decorating step,

06:01we're gonna take a little bit of frosting,

06:02dab it right into the middle of the plate

06:04and then place our bottom cake layer on there.

06:07That's gonna prevent the cake

06:08from moving around as we decorate it.

06:10Then we're gonna add a bit of frosting on top,

06:12flatten it out, rotating the cake stand,

06:15using that to help us to spread out that even layer,

06:18add in our next layer, another layer of frosting

06:21and then finally, we're gonna finish with our final cake

06:23and we're gonna put the flat side

06:25that was on the baking dish up

06:27so we have that beautiful flat top

06:29because I haven't done the best job trimming

06:31so I wanna hide it at least on top to make it look perfect.

06:34Also, I'd say if your layers are uneven,

06:37I would take, like if there are two that are most similar,

06:39I would put them on the outside

06:40and put the thinner or thicker one in the middle

06:42or you could just be like me and have janky cakes

06:44that don't all match, then we're not gonna care.

06:46Once you have the layers stacked up,

06:48you can put a bunch of frosting on top

06:49and start smoothing it out,

06:50letting the excess frosting fall to the sides of the cake.

06:54Then you can start using a bench scraper

06:56or a straight line to slightly pull against

06:59as you turn the cake stand

07:01and that will create those flat side edges.

07:04You don't have to do this but I really want to.

07:05I'm gonna top the cake with some beautiful

07:08little white nonpareil sprinkles and now we can serve it.

07:11I feel like I should be in a tea room

07:15with some nicer older women surrounding me

07:18and just giggle, giggle, giggling over pots of tea with this

07:22and taking our little baby bites of cake.

07:26This really does, I don't know if it's placebo

07:27because of how it looks,

07:29but it really does taste different

07:30than a normal vanilla yellow cake.

07:33It tastes lighter.

07:34I think it's because we used egg whites

07:35and sour cream instead of yolks.

07:38I also love the addition of almond extract in this.

07:41It adds an extra dimension of flavor

07:43so it's not just vanilla in your face.

07:45And I know that the recipe says that sprinkles are optional

07:47but these little white nonpareils

07:49give you a little like crunchy crunch

07:51at the top of each slice that I really like.

07:53I think this is a great celebration cake.

07:55I genuinely believe you could probably do

07:57six or seven more layers of different sizes

07:59and make this a wedding cake.

08:01A little side of berries would be nice with this.

08:04I think that'd be really great.

08:05I don't know, this cake makes me really smile.

08:07It just makes me feel really accomplished and really fancy.

08:11I don't make a lot of layer cakes

08:13so I'm genuinely really proud of myself

08:14for how this came out.

08:16And if you want to challenge yourself culinarily,

08:17you can find amazing cooking projects

08:19here on delish.com.

08:21Mm mm mm.

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