High Altitude Raspberry Vanilla Cake
This luscious raspberry vanilla cake has three layers of soft vanilla cake, filled with sweet raspberry jam, and frosted with both vanilla buttercream and raspberry buttercream.
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 Attachment
Ingredients
Cake
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- ½ vanilla bean, seeds scraped
- 1 ½ cups + 2 tbsp cake flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- 1 ½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 large egg
- 1 large egg white (save the extra yolk for another use)
- ¾ cup whole milk, room temperature
- 1 tsp lemon juice
- ¼ cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled for 10 minutes
- ¼ cup vegetable oil
Buttercream
- 1 ½ cups unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- ½ tbsp meringue powder
- 1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
- ⅛ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
Other
- 5 tbsp seedless raspberry jam
- fresh raspberries
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, position a rack in the center of the oven, and spray the bottoms of three 6-inch cake pans with non-stick baking spray.
- In a bowl, measure out the sugar. Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean pod and use your fingers to rub the seeds into the sugar until very fragrant and the seeds are evenly dispersed throughout the sugar.
- Set a fine mesh sifter over the bowl of sugar, and sift in the cake flour, baking powder and salt. Use a whisk to combine the dry ingredients well.
- In another bowl, whisk together the egg, egg white, milk, lemon juice, melted butter and oil until smooth.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet, and whisk until combined, about 10-15 seconds. A few lumps in the batter are okay; take care not to over mix. Divide the batter between the cake pans. Tap a few times against the counter to pop any large air bubbles.
- Bake the cakes for about 18-20 minutes, or until a cake tester or a toothpick comes out clean, and the tops spring back when lightly touched.
- Set the pans on a wire rack, cover them loosely with a clean kitchen towel, and cool completely before frosting. When ready to frost and assemble the cake, remove the cakes from the pans. If needed, use a sharp, non-serrated knife to level the cakes by cutting off the small domed portion on top.
Buttercream
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter for 1 minute until smooth.
- With the mixer running on low, add the powdered sugar by spoonfuls, the meringue powder and the salt, mixing until thick and combined.
- Add the vanilla; increase speed to medium and whip for 4-5 minutes, scraping the bowl down several times, until light and fluffy. Turn the speed down to stir and mix for 1 minute.
Assembly
- Place one of the cake layers on a cake board. Frost with a thick layer of buttercream, about 1/2 inch thick. Then, use the back of a spoon or your icing spatula to thin the center of the buttercream, creating a "well" in the center with a "dam" around the edge, to hold the raspberry jam inside.
- Spread 2 tablespoons of the raspberry jam in the well of buttercream. Top with the second layer of cake, and repeat the above steps. Finish by placing the third layer of cake on top.
- Frost the cake all over with a crumb coat of buttercream, then place the cake in the refrigerator to chill for 45 minutes.
- Meanwhile, take 1 1/4 cups of the buttercream and add 1 tablespoon of the raspberry jam, stirring until well combined.
- Spread a final layer of the vanilla buttercream on top of the chilled cake. Then spread the pink raspberry buttercream around the sides of the cake, using a bench scraper to smooth the sides of the cake.
- Decorate the top of the cake with raspberries.
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