Strawberry cake with strawberry buttercream made from fresh strawberries!
Strawberry cake made with fresh strawberries and no Jell-O? Yes, it’s possible and it’s delicious! The secret is adding a fresh strawberry reduction to your cake batter and mix the rest into your buttercream frosting for a fresh strawberry cake recipe that tastes like real strawberries!
If you’ve been to Pinterest lately, you will have approximately one TRILLION recipes for strawberry cake. I tried a few from some big-name blogs that I thought would for sure delivery and boy was I disappointed. Most recipes contained either Jell-O for the strawberry flavor or the use of a boxed mix.
“silently cries tears of pain”
I just wanted an easy scratch recipe made with real strawberries! Is that not too much to ask?
Now I am definitely not the best baker in the world but I do enjoy a challenge so I set myself up to see if I could make a really good strawberry cake. I gave myself two rules. I had to use real strawberries and the flavor had to taste like real strawberries in the cake alone.
Can you make a fresh strawberry cake without Jell-O?
Now don’t get me wrong. I love me some Jell-O but not in my cakes. Gelatin is not something I would think to add to my cake to make the texture light in fluffy, more like gummy and dense. I think the worst thing about a strawberry cake made with Jell-O is that it tastes like fake strawberries.
Pretty tasty in jolly ranchers but not so much in my cake. So one of my personal challenges was to make a strawberry cake without gelatin.
Fresh strawberry cake tests and fails
So I began testing my own strawberry cake recipes. I have never worked so long an hard on one recipe. SO many failed attempts and I almost gave up. This is probably way more information than you ever needed to know about strawberry cake.
Here are some of the things I tried to make a successful strawberry cake with fresh strawberries.
Can you just add fresh strawberries to vanilla cake to make a strawberry cake?
Have you ever seen a baking video where they just chop up fresh strawberries and add them to the cake batter and claim it tastes amazing? I’m sorry, but that’s a big fat lie.
When strawberries are baked, not only do they lose their strawberry flavor but they turn a really weird and sad grey color. It actually looks like pockets of rotten fruit in the cake batter. NOT appetizing at all!
In my first test, I chopped up some fresh strawberries and drained the juices. I added the chopped strawberries to the batter and the juice to the milk. I subtracted the same amount of milk as the juice that I added so I was not adding more liquid to my batter. I reduced the sugar by 1 oz to account for any sugar in the strawberries.I was pretty sure this would not work but I just wanted to make sure. Just as I feared, this cake was very wet, dense, and brown. Not the pretty strawberry cake I was imagining.
Freeze-Dried Strawberry Cake Test
In this test, I decided to use freeze-dried strawberries. Definitely not as easy to find as fresh but most places carry them. They are not cheap either. 1.7oz bag cost me about $4. I used the whole bag.
I ground up my strawberries in a spice grinder, sifted out the large chunks and added it to my dry ingredients. I had a feeling this cake might need some extra moisture so I upped the liquids and added a little vegetable oil. I also added a touch of pink and red food coloring to counteract the brown.
This cake was really good! The crumb was very nice, the flavor was a very bright, tart strawberry flavor and definitely a win in my book! But I was still searching for that recipe with REAL strawberries.
I decided to do one more test.
Fresh strawberry cake made with a strawberry reduction
I had tried using a strawberry reduction in previous tests but the texture was still really gummy. This time I tried reducing the liquids further to make a really thick reduction. I also added in lemon zest to intensify the tartness of the strawberry flavor.
I also used strawberry emulsion instead of strawberry extract (not necessary but helps with color and flavor). I also added a couple of drops of electric pink food coloring to get that pink color I was looking for.
The result? An incredibly moist and delicate strawberry cake that tasted EXACTLY like strawberries.
I kid you not, I screamed with joy when I cut into this cake! The crumb was PERFECT! The flavor is amazing! I pretty much ran to all the rooms of the house forcing my daughter, husband and assistant to all try the cake immediately. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t just going crazy. That this was the real deal!
Rave reviews all around! *self high-five*
How to make a strawberry reduction
- Combine your strawberries and sugar in a medium saucepan. If they are frozen, defrost them first. If they are fresh remove the tops and chop into chunks. Blend with an immersion blender if you prefer a smooth reduction.
- Bring the mixture to a boil and then reduce to low and let simmer. Occasionally stir to prevent burning.
- Once the strawberry reduction is thick like tomato paste, you’re good to go!
- Mix in the lemon zest, juice and salt.
- Let the strawberry reduction cool before using it in your cake batter. I use half in the batter and half in the frosting!
How to make your strawberry layer cake
If you need more information on how to frost and fill a cake, check out my how to make your first cake tutorial
- Make sure your cakes are chilled or even partially frozen when stacking so that they are easier to handle. Trim off the brown edges and tops if desired.
- Make your buttercream and fold in the leftover strawberry reduction for a fresh and tasty strawberry frosting!
- Put your first layer of strawberry cake down and then spread on a generous layer of frosting. Try to keep it flat.
- Place your next layer of cake on top and repeat with remaining layers.
- Cover the whole cake in a thin layer of strawberry buttercream and then chill in the fridge for 20 minutes until the buttercream is firm. This is called the crumb coat.
- Frost the cake with a final layer of buttercream and decorate as desired! This cake should be refrigerated until serving. Allow the cake to sit at room temperature for 2 hours before serving. Cold cake doesn’t taste very good!
I hope you enjoy this recipe! Please link to this recipe if you make it so that I can see your creations!
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Note: measurements are estimated based off the vanilla cake recipe using standard US cake pans and sizes. Measurements used are for 2" tall cake pans only. Your results may vary. Do not overfill cake pans above manufacturer's recommended guidelines.
Fresh Strawberry Cake With Strawberry Buttercream Recipe
Ingredients
Fresh Strawberry Cake Ingredients
- 14 ounces (397 g) all purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 8 ounces (226 g) unsalted butter room temperature
- 10 ounces (284 g) granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract
- 1 1/2 teaspoon strawberry emulsion or extract, I use LorAnn oils bakery emulsion
- zest one lemon
- 1 Tablespoon lemon juice fresh
- 6 ounces (170 g) egg whites room temperature
- 4 ounces (113 g) strawberry reduction room temperature
- 6 ounces (170 g) milk room temperature, whole milk is best
- 1/2 teaspoon Pink food color I use Americolor electric pink gel
Strawberry Reduction
- 32 ounces (907 g) fresh or frozen strawberries thawed
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
- 1 Tablespoon lemon juice
- 1 pinch salt
- 4 ounces (113 g) sugar optional
Easy Strawberry Buttercream Frosting
- 4 ounces (113 g) pasteurized egg whites
- 16 ounces (454 g) unsalted butter room temperature
- 16 ounces (454 g) powdered sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 4 ounces (113 g) strawberry reduction room temperature
Equipment
- Stand mixer with whisk and paddle attachments (or a hand mixer)
- Food Scale
- Three, 8"x2" round cake pans
- Wire rack
Instructions
Strawberry Reduction Instructions
- I recommend making this reduction the day before you're ready to make your cake.
- Place fresh or thawed, frozen strawberries into a medium saucepan. Optional: blend strawberries with an emersion blender if you prefer a smoother texture of strawberry reduction.
- Heat on medium-high and add in sugar (if desired), lemon zest, lemon juice and salt. Stir occasionally to prevent burning.
- Once bubbling, reduce heat to medium-low and slowly reduce until berries begin to break up and the mixture has reduced by about half. This will take about 20 minutes. If your mixture has reduced by half and is still watery, continue to cook until all of the liquid is out.
- Occasionally stir the mixture to prevent burning. You should end up with about 2 cups of thick strawberry reduction that looks like tomato sauce. Transfer to another container and let cool before use.
- You will use some of the reduction for the cake batter, some for the frosting and the rest for filling between the cake layers for extra moisture. Leftover reduction can be stored in the fridge for up to one week or frozen for 6 months.
Strawberry Cake Instructions
- NOTE: It is SUPER IMPORTANT that all the room temperature ingredients listed above are room temperature and not cold or hot.
- Make sure to take your strawberry reduction out of the refrigerator 1 hour before making your cake so that it comes to room temperature.
- Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and preheat to 350ºF/176ºC.
- Grease three 8" cake pans with cake goop or preferred pan release
- In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the milk, strawberry reduction, strawberry emulsion, vanilla extract, lemon extract, lemon zest, lemon juice, and pink food coloring.
- In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
- Add room temperature butter to your stand mixer with the paddle attachment and beat at medium speed until smooth and shiny, about 30 seconds.
- Gradually sprinkle in the sugar, beat until mixture is fluffy and almost white, about 3-5 minutes.
- Add the egg whites one at a time, beating 15 seconds in between. Your mixture should look cohesive at this point. If it looks curdled and broken, your butter or egg whites were too cold.
- Mix on low speed and add about a third of the dry ingredients to the batter, followed immediately by about a third of the milk mixture, mix until ingredients are almost incorporated into the batter. Repeat the process 2 more times. When the batter appears blended, stop the mixer and scrape the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula. If it looks like ice cream, you did it right!
- Divide the batter evenly between the prepared pans. Smooth the tops with a rubber spatula.
- Bake cakes at 350ºF/176ºC until they feel firm in the center and a toothpick comes out clean or with just a few crumbs on it, about 30-35 minutes.
- Place pans on top of a wire rack and let cool for 10 minutes. Then flip your cakes onto the racks and cool completely.
- Once cooled, wrap each layer in plastic wrap and refrigerate or freeze before assembling your cake.
Buttercream Instructions
- Place egg whites and powdered sugar in a stand mixer bowl. Attach the whisk and combine ingredients on low and then whip on high for 5 minutes
- Place pasteurized egg whites and powdered sugar in the bowl of your stand mixer. Add the whisk attachment and combine ingredients on low, then whip on high for 5 minutes.
- Add in your softened butter in chunks and whip on high for 8-10 minutes until it's very white, light and shiny. It may look curdled and yellow at first, this is normal. Keep whipping.
- Add in strawberry reduction, vanilla extract and salt and continue whipping until incorporated.
- Optional: Switch to a paddle attachment and mix on low for 15-20 minutes to make the buttercream very smooth and remove air bubbles.
Decorating the cake
- Place your first layer of strawberry cake onto a cake plate or cake board. Trim off the dome if needed with a sharp knife so the top of the cake is flat.
- Add a very thin layer or your cooled reduction over the cut surface. This helps soak into the cake and adds moisture and strawberry flavor.
- Add a layer of strawberry buttercream, I shoot for about 1/4". Smooth it with your offset spatula until it's flat.
- Frost the outside of your cake with the leftover buttercream and decorate with some fresh. strawberries if desired.
Notes
- Make sure all your ingredients (egg whites, milk, butter, reduction) are room temperature or a little warm so that your batter doesn't curdle.
- For the best success, use a food scale to weigh your ingredients. Converting this recipe to cups could lead to failure. Read my blog post on how to use a scale for more information.
- I use Americolor electric pink food coloring to get my beautiful pink color. It may seem like cheating, but if you don't add it, the color from the strawberries will bake out and your cake will turn out gray.
- I'm using my Bosch Universal Plus mixer for this, but you can use any KitchenAid stand mixer or a hand mixer.
- You must use egg WHITES for this recipe, the yellow from the egg could turn the inside of your cake peach.
- I like to use LorAnn oil's strawberry bakery emulsion, but you can also use extract.
- When making your reduction, the goal is to get as much liquid out as possible without burning the strawberries. The mixture should look like thick tomato sauce and will have reduced by half.
- You will use some of the reduction for the cake batter, some for the frosting and the rest for filling between the cake layers for extra moisture. Leftover reduction can be stored in the fridge for up to one week or frozen for 6 months.
- Make sure your frosting is very light and white before adding in the puree. Give it a taste, if it still tastes like butter, keep whipping it until it tastes like sweet ice cream.
- If your buttercream looks curdled, it's too cold. Take out 1/2 cup of buttercream and melt it in the microwave until it's just barely melted. About 10-15 seconds. Pour it back into your buttercream, and mix until creamy.
Nutrition
So delicious. Thank you for sharing. Wondering if it can be done on whipped cream frosting. Even cream cheese. Let me know. 😋Yum!
Oh yea, those would taste delicious!!
I made this recipe EXACTLY as instructed for my boyfriends birthday. First time every using a food scale. It came out PERFECT and everything looked and tasted as described. The only precious ingredient I forgot was a fresh lemon. I did not get to add the zest, and I ended up using lemon juice from a bottle. The cake was still beautiful and amazing! I will be making it again with the fresh lemon for juice and zest. This was my first attempt at making a cake from scratch like this and I’m really proud!
I definitely agree on using a scale. I read the article and it makes total sense why so many of my attempts at other cakes failed! Thank you Liz! <3 I wish I could upload my pictures, it came out so wonderful!!!
Great job! I love when people make that leap to using a scale and discover how much easier it makes things <3
Hi liz i was just wondering for the strawberry reduction what sugar did you use, did you use granulated sugar or caster sugar
Granulated which I think is very similar to caster sugar
Wow I’m so lucky I checked half way to notice it was almost done- the directions say 30-35 minutes but they took literally 20 minutes to fully cook!!! Smells amazing – can’t wait to try it!!
Every oven is different! So glad you liked the recipe <3
Hi Liz-my daughter loves this strawberry cake recipe and asked me to make it for her 16th bday this weekend. I am attempting to use your techniques on your rustic cake (with the chalkboard), wish me luck! How far in advance would you recommend I bake the cake before decorating? I’ve read on your site baking and crumb coating the day before is fine, but is it better to bake, frost and decorate the same day? Thank you!
Hi! Happy almost birthday to your daughter 😀 I would recommend baking your cakes the day before frosting. You can wrap them in plastic wrap and put them in the fridge or freezer.
Hey liz, Once the cakes are cooled, and i wrap each layer in plastic wrap and refrigerate before assembling my cake for the buttercream ingredients how long should the cakes be in fridge before starting the buttercream?
Just until they are firm and cold. If you’re in a hurry, put them in the freezer. For me it takes about 30 minutes to an hour
Hi Ms. Liz, I Have never been disappointed with any of your recipes, I would like to make this cake for a friends birthday. I my favorite pans are the magic line pans, 8 inch pans call for 3-1/4 cups of batter per pan, will this recipe make enough batter for me or should I increase the batter amount, If so how much, thank You
You can increase the amount if you want to but yes this makes three layers of cake, they are not 2″ tall though
I made this for my son’s birthday, he loves strawberry anything. It was so delicious and moist. The icing was fantastic! Not too sweet. Thank you for sharing. My son and guests loved this cake. They want more.
Definitely going to give this one a try ASAP! I have been on this same strawberry cake journey with no success so far 😣. I currently have three Ziploc bags sitting on my kitchen counter that are filled with cupcakes of three separate strawberry recipes followed to the letter. All about as awful as the next. Its a bad case of goldilocks cakes.
Oh no, let me know how you feel about this one <3
Hello, can I replace the strawberry with blueberries and make the cake? Should I make any changes to this recipe then? TIA
You definitely could!
So I read as many comments as I could before asking. One response says that you can use this recipe under fondant. Then in another comment you stated that you would only use the frosting as a filing and not as a crumb coat because of the moisture content. I’m making a 3 layer 8×2 cake that will need to be covered in fondant for a bottom tier. Can I use this whole recipe for this?
You can definitely use this recipe under fondant but use regular buttercream between the cake and the fondant and the strawberry frosting as the filling only
Yummy! Think you could do a cream cheese frosting instead? Would you add strawberry to the cream cheese frosting?
Sounds delicious! I would make the cream cheese frosting separately and then stir in some strawberries.
Is it safe to use egg whites in the buttercream? How to ensure we manage bacteria issues?
The eggs are pasteurized already (heat-treated) and safe to use.
Can this cake sit out a few days? I plan to make a Bundt and ship to my daughter with the frosting to frost her cake for a pandemic birthday solo. Will it keep 3 days at room temp?
No I would not advise shipping a fresh fruit cake, it will most likely mold
What do you do if it is curdled
Your butter was probably too cold, trying taking out 1/2 cup of the buttercream and microwaving it until just melted, then whip it back into your frosting. Hope that helps!
I bake cakes for Family, Friends and Co-workers for the Holidays. Just joking around one day with my friend, I told him I would make any cake he would like. He said Strawberry is his favorite! OK! I have never made a Strawberry cake, just put stawberries slices on a cake, but not make a full flavor strawberry cake. Watch your videos and just love how your cakes look and turn out. You are the first recipe, I have tried searching for strawberry cake recipes. I just want to say one thing about this cake recipe……………..AWESOME! My friend said it taste like Strawberry shortcake, I think it taste like strawberry Ice Cream. OMG, the flavors are explosive! I’m taking your strawberry cake recipe as my strawberry cake recipe. I really can’t put into words how the flavor is so bold and just plan Good! I would recommend any baker, home baker, first time baker to try this recipe. It is very,very tasty. 😀
I made this cake for my sister’s last birthday and it was gorgeous!!! Didn’t get the colour but it turned out to be a lovely pale pink. Recipe was easy to follow and definitely worth the effort. Very tasty and my sister loved it, so rare to find a cake recipe with FRESH strawberries 🙂
I was hoping to make it again for my future housemates, only problem is one of them can’t eat much wheat. I know it’s quite a niche question but I was wondering if you had any suggestions for substitutions and if they would work. If not, that’s totally fine! I understand wheat free baking is a lot more temperamental. Thank you 🙂
Sounds so good, can’t wait to make!! I live at high altitude. What adjustments should I make? Can I use high altitude flour? TIA
Hi! Check out my high-altitude baking hacks blog post! https://sugargeekshow.com/news/high-altitude-baking-hacks/
Hey! I don’t have any lemon extract for the cake batter. Have you tried almond extract in it? Would almond extract taste ok?
You can leave it out if you dont have it
OMG..SOOO GOOD! I made sum alterations but it still came out perfect and I used only two pans and my own buttercream frosting w/o the egg white. BUT STILL THANK YOU! Great cake ❤️
Hi there. I was just wondering if I would be able to leave out the red food coloring? My son is very sensitive to food colorings….
Unfortunately, if you leave out the food coloring in this recipe the cake will turn out more gray than pink because the color in the strawberries bakes out in the oven.
Hi Liz. I am about to make this cake. It I also have a quick question. Would I be able to do this same cake for banana and swap out the purée for bananas and the emulsion for banana emulsion? Please let me know if it is possible. Thank you.
I would not use this recipe for banana cake, I have a banana cake recipe if you want to make banana cake
Made this for Easter, turned out great! First strawberry cake recipe that tastes like the ones I remember my Grandma making!
Yum! Can you just ship me a slice lol
I am so excited to find a moist, strawberry rich, REAL strawberry cake! I made this recipe for the middle tier of a large wedding cake for this weekend. It not only tasted amazing, but held its shape well for transport and cutting. Thank you for sharing another great recipe!