Today’s red and white Valentines cake features three layers of fluffy and moist white velvet and red velvet cake. A demure coat of vanilla buttercream covered in pretty little red hearts is the perfect sweet touch to this pretty Valentine’s Day cake. Everyone will love when you cut the cake to reveal the striking red and white striped cake layers inside!
Looking for more Valentine’s Day desserts? Don’t miss these buttercream filled Valentine Linzer cookies, heart shaped strawberry shortbread cookies, and ruby chocolate truffles.
This site contains affiliate links. As an Amazon associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. This means that I may make a small commission if you purchase a product using those links. This in no way affects my opinion of those products and services. All opinions expressed on this site are my own.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Simple to Decorate. When I originally made this cake for Valentine’s Day in 2021, I decorated it with little red hearts that I piped with red buttercream. For an updated look in 2024, I simply used red heart shaped sprinkles arranged in a polka dot pattern. Whichever you choose to do, the end result is so pretty and sweet.
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
- White Velvet Cake. My white velvet cake is a delicious white cake that’s soft, fluffy and moist. It’s a personal favorite of mine out of all the cakes on my blog.
- Perfect American Buttercream. Next you’ll need to make a batch of American buttercream. Make 4x the recipe to have enough to frost an 8-inch 3 layer cake.
- Red Gel Food Coloring. You’ll need red gel food coloring to tint 1/3 of the cake batter, as well as to color a small amount of buttercream for the little red piped hearts. I recommend Super Red Gel Food Coloring for the deepest, truest shade of red.
- Dutch-processed Cocoa Powder. If you only add red gel food coloring to white cake batter, you’ll end up with pink cake. To get a darker shade of red, you’ll need to add a tablespoon of Dutch-processed cocoa powder to the cake batter, too.
- Piping Bag + Coupler + Tip #3. To pipe the buttercream hearts, I used tip #3, which is a very small round tip. For bigger hearts, you could use a slightly bigger round tip.
If you’re only interested in decorating the outside of today’s red and white Valentines cake, then you can certainly use any cake flavor that you like. Or, you could always buy a white box cake mix, and tint 1/3 of the batter red as noted in the recipe, for the alternating red and white layers of this Valentine’s Day cake. For a from-scratch version, though, I recommend my White Velvet Cake or my popular Vanilla Cake.
Instructions
Make the White Velvet Cake Batter
- Preheat the oven to 350, and spray the bottoms of three 8-inch cake pans with non-stick spray.
- Prepare the White Velvet Cake batter as instructed.
Color 1/3 of the Cake Batter Red
- Divide 2/3 of the cake batter between 2 of the pans.
- To the remaining 1/3 of the cake batter, add the cocoa powder (it’s helpful to sift the cocoa powder over the cake batter and then whisk it in, to avoid lumps).
- Add a few drops of red gel food coloring, until you have your desired shade of red. Pour the red batter into the 3rd cake pan.
Bake the Cake
- Bake on the center oven rack for about 25-30 minutes, until a cake tester or toothpick comes out clean.
- Set the pans on a wire rack, cover loosely with a clean kitchen towel, and cool completely before frosting.
Make the Buttercream and Frost the Cake
- Prepare the American Buttercream as instructed: you’ll need to make 4x the recipe to have enough to frost a 3-layer cake. For a bright white buttercream, substitute shortening for 1/2 of the butter in the recipe.
- Remove the cooled cakes from the cake pans, and place one of the white cakes on a cake board. Frost with a layer of buttercream. Add the red cake layer next, frost with a layer of buttercream, and top with the other white cake, so that the red is sandwiched between two layers of white.
- Frost the cake all over with a thin crumb coat of buttercream. Chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
- Frost the cake with a final pretty coat of buttercream. You can make it smooth or swirly, whatever you like. Chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
Pipe the Red Hearts
- Take the remaining buttercream (you’ll only need 1/2 cup) and tint it red with the red food coloring.
- Fit a piping bag with a coupler and tip #3; fill with the red buttercream.
- Pipe small red hearts all over the cake. You can line them up evenly in a polka dot pattern, or make them random. Here is a helpful Wilton tutorial on piping these easy, pretty hearts.
- And if you’re not inclined to pipe buttercream hearts, then decorate your cake with candy sprinkle hearts! Your Valentines cake will be so cute either way.
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 refer to this Wilton tutorial for piping the hearts.
I had the sprinkles from a Valentine sprinkle mix I bought at my grocery store. This Sweets Indeed Sprinkle Mix contains similar heart shaped sprinkles.
No, the photographed cake is a three-layer 6-inch cake, made using half of my white velvet cake recipe.
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!
Red and White Valentines 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
- Stand Mixer with Paddle and Whisk Attachments
- Piping Bag fitted with Tip #3
Ingredients
Cake
- 1 recipe White Velvet Cake
- Super Red Gel Food Coloring
- 1 tbsp unsweetened Dutch-processed cocoa powder, whisked free of lumps
Buttercream
- 4x recipe Perfect American Buttercream
- Super Red Gel Food Coloring
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350, and spray the bottoms of three 8-inch cake pans with non-stick spray.
- Prepare the White Velvet Cake batter as instructed.
- Divide 2/3 of the cake batter between 2 of the pans.
- To the remaining 1/3 of the cake batter, add the cocoa powder (it's helpful to sift the cocoa powder over the cake batter and then whisk it in, to avoid lumps). Add a few drops of red gel food coloring, until you have your desired shade of red. Pour the red batter into the 3rd cake pan.
- Bake on the center oven rack for about 25-30 minutes, until a cake tester or toothpick comes out clean. Set the pans on a wire rack, cover loosely with a clean kitchen towel, and cool completely before frosting.
Buttercream & Assembly
- Prepare the American Buttercream as instructed: you'll need to make 4x the recipe to have enough to frost a 3-layer cake. For a bright white buttercream, substitute shortening for 1/2 of the butter in the recipe.
- Remove the cooled cakes from the cake pans, and place one of the white cakes on a cake board. Frost with a layer of buttercream.
- Add the red cake layer next, frost with a layer of buttercream, and top with the other white cake, so that the red is sandwiched between two layers of white.
- Frost the cake all over with a thin crumb coat of buttercream. Chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
- Frost the cake with a final pretty coat of buttercream. You can make it smooth or swirly, whatever you like. Chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
- Take the remaining buttercream (you'll only need 1/2 cup) and tint it red with the red food coloring. Fit a piping bag with a coupler and tip #3; fill with the red buttercream.
- Pipe small red hearts all over the cake. You can line them up evenly like a polkadot pattern, or make them random. Here is a helpful Wilton tutorial on piping these easy, pretty hearts.
This cake was absolutely a hoot to make with my 3 grandsons. Because they each have a specialty, I only needed to make the ingredients available, stand back, & watch with smiling amazement. The 3-year-old is an egg cracker extraordinaire. He’s also good with measuring out sugar, salt, & spices. The 8-year-old likes to measure out the flour & milk & put them together in three stages to yield the batter. The 11-year-old likes to put it all together as well–but then so do the others; so the two younger boys did the cake; the older & middle grand made the frosting. Decorating the cake is a favorite task for all of them to do. It’ll be made again and presented with love to their moms & dads in a couple of weeks. Thanks so much for the recipe, Heather.