This Patriotic Layer Cake is a Memorial Day and 4th of July dessert that tastes as good as it looks! Layers of red, white, and blue cake are covered with sweet vanilla buttercream and topped with sprinkles for an extra festive touch. It's the perfect cake for any patriotic celebration.
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Ingredients
Cake
3cupsall-purpose flourplus extra for dusting cake pans
2teaspoons baking powder
1teaspoon baking soda
½teaspoonsalt
1cupunsalted butterroom temperature
1cup granulated sugar
4egg whitesroom temperature
2teaspoons clear vanilla extract
1 ½ cups buttermilk or whole milk
red and blue food gel coloring1 drop of each
Buttercream Frosting
2cups unsalted butterroom temperature
6-8 cupspowdered sugar
2teaspoonsvanilla extract
¼cup heavy whipping cream
½teaspoonsalt
1cupred, white and blue sprinkles
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350°. Grease three 8 or 9 inch cake pans with butter or shortening and dust with flour. Set aside.
Start with making the cake batter. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt until well combined.
In a separate large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar with an electric hand mixer on medium speed until the mixture is light and fluffy.
Add the egg whites and vanilla extract, and continue beating on medium speed until mixed.
Pour in about a third of the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, and beat on low speed until just combined.
Add the rest of the dry ingredients along with the buttermilk, and fold together until barely combined.
Divide the batter evenly between 3 small bowls. A digital scale will make this much easier than just eyeballing it.
Add about 1/8 teaspoon (or a drop) of red gel food coloring and blue gel food coloring to two separate bowls of batter, and stir until the colors are well mixed.
Pour each bowl of batter into the three cake tins. Bake in the preheated oven for 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cakes comes out clean. Rest the cakes on a cooling rack until they reach room temperature.
Buttercream Frosting
While the cakes are cooling, make the buttercream frosting. In a large bowl, cream the butter with an electric hand mixer on medium speed for about 3 minutes, or until the butter is very smooth.
Gradually add the powdered sugar, and continue mixing with the hand mixer until the frosting is thick and stiff.
Add the vanilla extract, salt, and heavy whipping cream, and continue beating until everything is mixed.
Transfer the frosting to a piping bag with a large round tip. Place the blue layer of the cake onto a platter or cake stand, and pipe even circles around the top of the blue layer. Spread the frosting out with a spatula. Repeat this step with the white and red cake layers.
Once you have spread out the frosting on the top red cake layer, spread a thin layer of frosting on the edges of the cake. This will be your crumb coat. Place the cake in the freezer for 20-30 minutes or until the crumb coat is slightly hard.
Spread a thicker layer of frosting on the edges of the cake, and pipe some of the frosting on top around the edge in a piping bag with a large star piping tip.
Press some sprinkles along the bottom edges of the cake, and pour the rest of the sprinkles on top.