This high altitude London fog layer cake has three layers of fluffy vanilla cake infused with earl grey tea. With tea leaves in the buttercream, too, there’s plenty of earl grey flavor in this delicious cake.
You might also love these high altitude recipes for lemon iced earl grey cookies, earl grey honey scones, and earl grey ice cream.
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What’s a London Fog Cake?
A “London Fog” is a drink, which is basically an earl grey latte, made with earl grey tea instead of coffee, warm frothy milk and a sweetener. It’s an easy concept to carry over into a cake, with tea steeped in hot milk, as well as crushed tea leaves mixed right into the cake batter and the buttercream. If you love the flavor of earl grey tea, you’ll really love this cake! For a one layer cake option, see my earl grey tea cake, that’s baked in a Charlotte pan and topped with honey whipped cream.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Reader Favorite Base Recipe. If you’ve made my vanilla cake before, you’ll find that today’s cake is based on that one, with the additional steps of steeping the tea in milk first, and adding loose tea leaves to the dry ingredients. This is one of my most popular cake recipes, known for it’s soft, fluffy and moist texture.
High Altitude Tested. I develop all the recipes on my site for Denver’s altitude of 5,280 feet. If you’re at a lower or higher elevation, please see my FAQs for guidance on adjusting recipes for your altitude.
See the recipe card at the end of the post for the full ingredients list and instructions.
Ingredients
- Cake Flour. Cake flour has a lower percentage of protein than all-purpose flour, and will give this cake a lighter, softer texture.
- Earl Grey Tea. You can use tea bags, or loose tea. Each tea bag has about 1 teaspoon of tea leaves inside. I prefer using decaf tea, since some people (myself included) are sensitive to caffeine.
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven. Lightly spray three 6-inch round cake pans with non-stick baking spray.
- Heat the milk until steaming hot. Add two of the tea bags to the milk. Let the tea steep in the milk for 30 minutes while the milk cools.
- In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Cut open the third tea bag, and whisk the loose tea leaves into the flour mixture.
- Remove the tea bags from the milk.
- To the dry ingredients, add the milk, egg, egg white, melted butter, oil, and vanilla, and whisk until smooth, about 20 seconds.
- Divide the batter between the cake pans. Bake the cakes for about 20-25 minutes, until the tops spring bag when gently touched and a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Set the pans on a cooling rack, and cool the cakes completely before frosting.
Buttercream
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter for one minute, until smooth.
- In a bowl, combine the powdered sugar, the tea leaves from one tea bag, meringue powder, and salt. With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar mixture by spoonfuls. Add the vanilla.
- Increase the speed to medium, and whip the buttercream for 4-5 minutes, stopping to scrape the bowl down several times, until very light and fluffy. Only add the milk if the buttercream is too stiff. Turn the speed down to “stir”, and mix for one more minute.
- Remove the cakes from the pans. Stack, fill and frost the cakes with the buttercream. For a simple decoration, I used tip 1M to pipe swoops around the edge of the cake.
Be sure to read all of my BAKING FAQs where I discuss ingredients, substitutions and common questions with cake making, so that you can be successful in your own baking! I also suggest reading these comprehensive posts on making Perfect American Buttercream, How to Stack, Fill, Crumb Coat and Frost Layer Cakes and How to Use Piping Bags.
Frequently Asked Questions
You can use any brand of earl grey tea, but keep in mind that it contains caffeine, unless you use decaf tea.
Keep the leftover cake in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2-3 days, or in the freezer for up to 3-6 months.
You Might Also Like
Please check out my Amazon Shop for a curated collection of some of my favorite cake pans from trusted brands, baking tools, ingredients, pretty things and fashion finds. I recommend products that I buy and use every day!
Did you love today’s recipe? Please rate the recipe and let me know in the comments what you thought! Also, be sure to follow Curly Girl Kitchen on Instagram, and tag me when you try one of my recipes so I can see all your delicious creations!
High Altitude London Fog Layer Cake
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- 6-inch Round Cake Pans (x3)
- Stand Mixer with Paddle Attachment
Ingredients
Cake
- ¾ cup whole milk, steaming hot
- 3 earl grey tea bags, divided
- 1 ½ cups + 2 tbsp cake flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 1 ½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 large egg, room temperature
- 1 large egg white, room temperature (save the yolk for another use)
- ¼ cup unsalted butter, melted
- ¼ cup vegetable oil
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Buttercream
- 1 ½ cups unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- 1 earl grey tea bag
- 1 tsp meringue powder, optional
- ⅛ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 1-2 tbsp milk, if needed
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven. Lightly spray three 6-inch round cake pans with non-stick baking spray.
- Heat the milk until steaming hot. Add two of the tea bags to the milk. Let the tea steep in the milk for 30 minutes while the milk cools.
- In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Cut open the third tea bag, and whisk the loose tea leaves into the flour mixture.
- Remove the tea bags from the milk.
- To the dry ingredients, add the milk, egg, egg white, melted butter, oil, and vanilla, and whisk until smooth, about 20 seconds.
- Divide the batter between the cake pans. Bake the cakes for about 20-25 minutes, until the tops spring bag when gently touched and a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Set the pans on a cooling rack, and cool the cakes completely before frosting.
Buttercream
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter for one minute, until smooth.
- In a bowl, combine the powdered sugar, the tea leaves from one tea bag, meringue powder, and salt. With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar mixture by spoonfuls. Add the vanilla.
- Increase the speed to medium, and whip the buttercream for 4-5 minutes, stopping to scrape the bowl down several times, until very light and fluffy. Only add the milk if the buttercream is too stiff. Turn the speed down to "stir", and mix for one more minute.
- Remove the cakes from the pans. Stack, fill and frost the cakes with the buttercream. For a simple decoration, I used tip 1M to pipe swoops around the edge of the cake.
Notes
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