RED VELVET CAKE RECIPE with Cream Cheese Frosting

This is the most requested cake on our channel and I'm gonna teach you how to make it .

Hey , everybody .

It's Natasha Natasha's kitchen dot com .

And today I'm gonna show you how to make red velvet cake .

This is moist and you're gonna love how we make the ultimate cream cheese frosting .

And I'm craving cake .

So let's get started .

You'll need to preheat your oven to 350 F .

Then grease 29 inch cake pans with butter .

Also to keep the cakes from sticking to the pans .

I also like to dust with a little bit of flour and make sure to tap out the excess .

Once you have your cake pans , buttered and floured , set those aside until you're ready to use them .

This quick prep will ensure that the cakes release easily .

Now , we'll make the cake batter combine 2.5 cups of all purpose flour , two tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa , a teaspoon of baking soda and half a teaspoon of salt quickly whisk those together just until they're combined .

Now we're gonna sift the dry ingredients to make sure everything is really well blended , sifting .

Also ensures that your cake crumb is soft and fluffy and I will link to this sifter in the notes , set aside the dry ingredients .

Now , in a large mixing bowl , combine one half cup or one stick of softened unsalted butter and 1.5 cups of sugar cream .

Those together with an electric mixer .

It takes a minute or two for the butter and sugar to come together and you just want to keep mixing until the sugar is moistened with butter and it has a powdery snowy consistency .

You'll need two room temperature eggs , add those one at a time beating .

Well , with each addition , once the eggs are well incorporated , add two teaspoons of vanilla extract and we're using our homemade extract .

I will leave a link to the two ingredient recipe in the notes .

Quickly blend in that vanilla .

Now with the mixer on add 3/4 cup of vegetable oil or you can use a light olive oil .

I have one cup of a room temperature low fat buttermilk and into that , I'm gonna stir in one teaspoon of white vinegar .

The buttermilk and vinegar mixture adds great moisture to the cake and activates the baking soda .

So you end up with a very fluffy cake , add the buttermilk mixture and blend until smooth and well incorporated .

Now add your dry ingredients all at once and with the mixer on low speed stir until well blended , stop mixing once it's evenly moist and you no longer see any dry streaks of flour .

Also make sure to scrape down the bowl while you're mixing to catch any pockets of flour .

Now , last but not least we're gonna turn this into a red velvet cake batter to make it that classic red color .

I highly recommend using a gel food coloring .

This is the one that I'm using and I will link to this in the recipe notes .

All you need is half a teaspoon and a little bit goes a long way .

You could even use less food coloring if you wanted to just add it to your preference .

Using the mixer on low speed mix until the color is well incorporated into the batter , scraping down the bowl as needed .

Once the batter is uniform in color , you're gonna transfer it and divide it evenly between your prepared cake pans .

My best tip for getting even cake layers is to use a digital kitchen scale .

Zero out your cake pan .

Then you can see exactly how much batter you've poured into each cake pan and make sure to get every last drop of that yummy red velvet cake batter .

Now use your spatula to spread the batter evenly into the pans and we're going to transfer that and bake in a preheated oven at 350 F for about 30 minutes .

What I love about this recipe is the cake layers rise evenly and have a level top .

So there's no need to trim to test for doneness , insert a toothpick into the center of the cake and it should come out clean .

Once the layers are out of the oven , let them rest in their pans for about 20 minutes , run a thin spatula or knife around the edges of the cake to loosen them from the pans .

Now carefully invert the cake onto a wire rack .

Sometimes you need to give the pan a little tap for it to slide out , but normally they slide out easily .

Once your layers are on your rack , you want to set those aside and let them cool completely to room temperature .

Before adding the frosting and assembling your cake to make our favorite cream cheese frosting .

You'll need 1.5 cups or 3/4 pound of unsalted softened butter , make sure you do not over soften your ingredients .

This has been at room temperature for about an hour and a half and you can see that you can indent it slightly with your finger , but it should still be a little bit cool to the touch that butter in pieces to a large mixing bowl and use an electric mixer to beat that on high speed for about a minute or until it's smooth and lightened in color .

And it's important to scrape down the bowl periodically to make sure you don't have any chunks of butter that aren't blended .

Now , add your softened cream cheese and again , you wanna use a block style cream cheese and make sure it's not overly softened .

The key to having a thick and spread cream cheese frosting is to make sure that your ingredients are at the right temperature .

Now beat those together on medium high speed until the cream cheese and butter are well incorporated , scraping down the bowl as needed .

Now add one tablespoon of vanilla extract and an eighth of a teaspoon or a generous pinch of salt beat those in until well combined .

I like to add four cups or a total of £1 of powdered sugar because I think it has the best balance of sweetness .

We're gonna add the powdered sugar one cup at a time and mix on low speed until it's incorporated .

Once all of the powdered sugar is in kick the mixer up to high speed and continue beating for another 2 to 3 minutes or until the frosting is whipped thick and spread .

All right , our frosting is ready and our cake is now at room temperature .

So it's time to assemble , place that first cake layer onto a serving platter and we're gonna add a generous amount of frosting over the top .

I love a thick layer of frosting between my cake layers .

So I'm using about a third of the frosting spread that evenly to the edges of the cake .

Now top that with your second cake layer and I like to place it upside down so that you have the smoothest most even surface for the top .

Now we're gonna crumb coat the cake , which means that you're gonna apply a thin layer of frosting all the way around the cake crumb coating , glues the crumbs down and seals in the moisture of the cake .

Once you've finished with an even crumb coat , add a little bit more frosting to the top and sides until it's evenly coated .

I love using my offset spatula for this .

It makes frosting your cake so much easier and I will link to this tool in all of our favorite tools in the notes .

Once you're satisfied with your frosted cake , wipe the base of the cake platter with a paper towel .

Now transfer the remaining frosting into a piping bag fitted with a large open star tip .

We're gonna use the rest of this cream cheese frosting to pipe puffs over the top of the cake and because the frosting has been out for a little bit and I'd like it to firm up .

I'm gonna pop this into the refrigerator while we add sprinkles to the cake .

This is how I like to decorate my red velvet cake .

I'm using two different kinds of red sprinkles start by adding the larger sprinkles around the top border of the cake .

Also apply some sprinkles to the bottom edge of the cake and I'm just gently tossing the sprinkles onto the side .

I don't have any secret tricks for this and because I have the base of my cake platter , clean .

I'm able to reuse some of the sprinkles that fall off the edge .

I'm also using some red sanding sugar and following the same pattern and the sanding sugar just fills in the sprinkles this way of decorating makes it look really pretty for a birthday or Valentine's Day or even Christmas .

Once you've cleaned off your extra sprinkles from your cake platter , we're gonna pipe that chilled frosting over the top , add little rosettes or puffs over the edges of the cake before cutting into this .

I like to refrigerate it for about an hour .

This will firm up the frosting slightly and just make it much easier to slice .

Yeah , I was excited I am because I get to have some cake and it's just firm enough now where I can slice it easily .

That's the only reason to refrigerate just to make it easier to serve the cake layers .

Stay together a little bit better .

So that's what we're gonna do .

We're gonna do the taste test because I want some cake .

All right , here we go .

And I do like to wipe the knife in between slices .

So that way you'll get a really clean cut just like we do with cheesecake .

OK .

Here we go .

Oh my goodness .

Look at that .

Oh OK .

Yum .

Yum Yum .

Yum .

OK .

And we're just gonna go for it because I want my cake .

Well , I have my cake .

I'm gonna eat it too .

Ok , here we go .

Uh And it is so soft .

The cream and the cake super moist .

Just the perfect crumb .

Mhm .

And yeah .

Mm .

That is exquisite .

We're bringing out the big words .

Seriously .

It tastes like a bakery quality cake .

Like a fancy bakery .

It is moist and you can taste that little bit of cocoa in the cake .

The cake itself has so much rich flavor .

It's just so decadent and delicious .

Seriously .

It's like I , I can't stop it .

Just one bite because it's really good .

It's like melt in your mouth .

Delicious .

Hm .

Yeah .

Mm .

Mhm .

I also love that .

It's not overly sweet .

Both the cake and the frosting .

It is just right and maybe that's why I can always eat a really big piece .

You can freeze the cake and you can freeze the frosting , which is awesome because I love make a head desserts perfect for parties .

Make sure to check out more desserts at Natasha's kitchen dot com .

And if you're building a Valentine's Day menu or a menu for any special occasion , really check out some of our best recipes right over there and right down there and we'll see you in our next video .