This weekend I made a baby shower cake for a former coworker of mine. She requested a vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream, so I’m going to share my go-to white cake recipe with you today. It is a pretty simple recipe, but it’s always moist and delicious! You may notice in the pictures, I made a much larger recipe than this. The recipe below is a good amount for one 9-10 inch cake. I’ve included a link to my favorite buttercream also!
WHITE CAKE
- 1 cup Buttermilk
- 1 cup Oil
- 2 ea Eggs
- 1 tsp Vanilla
- 1 tsp White Vinegar
- 1 1/2 cups Sugar
- 2 1/2 cups Flour
- 1 tsp Salt
- 1 tsp Baking Soda
You can mix this cake batter by hand, with a hand mixer, or in a stand mixer. I prefer to use my stand mixer because I think it keeps the flour from clumping up the best. I also like to bake my cakes in deep cake pans, and then cut the layers after baking, but you could easily split the batter into shallow cake pans and bake it in layers…or even cupcakes! Preheat your oven to 350°F.
- For this recipe, you can measure all of the liquid ingredients and the sugar together, and you can measure all of the dry ingredients (except the sugar) together. Place all of the liquid ingredients and sugar in your mixing bowl. Using the whisk attachment, mix on low speed until your ingredients are well incorporated.
- Sift your remaining dry ingredients. Add the flour mixture to the mixing bowl with
your liquids. Slowly start your mixer, still using the whisk attachment, and mix until the ingredients are well incorporated and you don’t see any flour chunks. You can turn it up to a higher speed to smooth the mixture a bit. Be sure to scrape the sides and bottom of your bowl with a spatula. 
- Spray your cake pans with pan spray and line them with parchment paper.
Fill them about 3/4 full with batter. Place the pans in the oven until they are a golden color, the middle springs back when pressed, and a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the middle comes out clean. 
The time will vary depending on your oven and the pans you choose to use. I used a 6 inch cake pan, a 9 inch cake pan, and a Wilton giant cupcake cake pan. The 6 inch cake pan and the giant cupcake pan took about 45 minutes, and the 9 inch cake pan took closer to an hour.
- Once your cakes have cooled, you can
decorate them however you’d like! I always use my favorite Swiss buttercream recipe. For the cakes I made using this batch of white cake, I split my buttercream in half, and added about a cup of melted chocolate to one half for a nice chocolate icing.
- If you didn’t bake your cake in layers, you will need to slice it into layers. I like to use a turntable and a bread knife. Place your cake on the turntable and hold the top of it with your non dominant hand. Position your knife as straight as you can along the side and hold your elbow into the side of your body. Turn the cake/turntable slowly, without moving the knife or your elbow. Keep spinning until the knife goes through the whole cake and slices a nice, even layer.
This method will produce a much straighter 
cut layer than if you try to push the knife through the cake.
- Once you have your layers cut, you can assemble your cake. I like to place a little buttercream on the cake board to help keep my cake from sliding. Then place your bottom layer on the board, and spread some buttercream on top. An offset spatula is my favorite tool for spreading icing between cake layers. Place the next layer of cake on top, and then another layer of icing. Adding fresh, sliced strawberries between the layers makes this cake extra delicious.
- Once your cake is fully assembled, you can decorate it. I like to cover my cakes with a crumb coat of icing and place it in the refrigerator to harden before decorating. Then color your buttercream with food coloring and either spread your icing on with an offset spatula or pipe it into a fun design with a piping bag and piping tips to complete your cake! Below are the two cakes I made using this cake recipe and Swiss buttercream.
