Description

This is THE vegan vanilla cake that will put all vanilla cake recipes to shame. It’s incredibly soft, moist with a beautifully tight crumb and decadently sweet- yet, you’d never know it’s made entirely without eggs and dairy free. Slathered in a vanilla bean dairy free cream cheese frosting, absolutely everyone loves this vanilla cake recipe, vegan or not. It’s guaranteed to turn even the chocolate cake lovers into vanilla ones.

Ingredients

Scale

Vegan Vanilla Cake:

1 1/4 cup (300 mL) vegan buttermilk
4 cups (500 g) cake flour (see notes for all-purpose flour or gluten free 1:1 baking flour)
3 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp sea salt
2 1/4 cups (450 g) granulated sugar
1 cup (220 g) salted vegan butter, room temperature
1/4 cup (60 mL) neutral oil, such as avocado oil, olive oil, or sunflower oil
1 cup (240 g) dairy free yogurt, room temperature*
2 tbsp vanilla extract (yes, 2 tablespoons!!)
Optional (but recommended): 1/4 tsp vanilla powder or vanilla bean paste

Frosting:

1 batch of either vegan vanilla cream cheese frosting (recommended) or vanilla buttercream frosting
1/4 cup (60 mL) cold vegan heavy cream

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Instructions

Prep: Preheat the oven to 350 F. Grease three 8″ cake pans with cooking oil, and line them with parchment paper. Set aside. For beginner bakers who want to simply whisking the ingredients together, see below for instructions.
Prepare the vegan buttermilk: Combine the dairy free milk with the apple cider vinegar, and set aside to sit for 3-4 minutes. You can weigh and measure the remaining ingredients during this time.
Whisk: In a large liquid measuring cup, whisk together the vegan buttermilk, dairy-free yogurt, vanilla extract, and vanilla bean paste. Set aside.
Mix the dry ingredients: In the bowl of your stand mixer, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and sea salt.
Mix in the butter: In a stand mixer with paddle attachment or a large bowl with hand mixer, add in the room temperature vegan butter and oil. Begin mixing on low speed, and as the butter incorporates into the flour, turn it up to medium speed. It will create a sandy texture in the flour mixture. There should be no clumps of butter left, just a wet sandy texture.
Finish the batter: Then pour in the buttermilk/yogurt mixture. Carefully turn the stand mixer onto low speed again to slowly start to integrate the wet ingredients into the batter. Then mix on medium speed until you get a consistent and smooth batter, scraping down the sides and at the bottom of the bowl as needed. Be careful here NOT to over mix- just when you achieve the smooth or near smooth batter, stop. You want to make sure the flour is FULLY incorporated into the wet or the cake won’t bake right- the ingredients will look slightly split, which means you need to keep gently mixing until you get a consistent batter.
Bake: Divide the batter between the three cake pans evenly, and bake for 28-30 minutes in 8″ cake pans, or until the toothpick comes out nearly clean with a few crumbs on.
Cool: Remove from the oven and allow the cakes to cool in their pans for 10 minutes, then transfer them to a cooling rack to cool completely. Once cooled completely (there is absolutely no warmth to the touch!), then you can prepare your buttercream.
Make the frosting. When ready to frost the cakes, follow the instructions for making the frosting of your choice.
Crumb coat: Apply about 1/2 cup of frosting between each layer, and a thin layer of frosting on the outside of the entire cake, sealing in the crumbs. Place the cake into the fridge to chill for 20-30 minutes.
Make the finishing frosting: While the cake is chilling, mix the vegan heavy cream on high-speed into the remaining frosting, whipping it until it’s thick, fluffy, and glossy.
Finish the frosting: Remove the cake from the fridge, and apply the glossy frosting on top, piping as desired. Then chill before serving or slice and serve immediately!

Notes

PLEASE NOTE: This recipe does NOT work with self-raising flour (either gluten-free or plain). Please do NOT swap in self-raising flour in this recipe!

Flour alternatives: You can use all-purpose flour or gluten-free baking flour. For gluten-free, I recommend King Arthur Measure-for-Measure gluten free flour. Whatever GF mix you use, it must contain xanthan gum. For the measurements, you will use 450g (3 2/3 cup) flour with 50 g (5 tbsp) cornstarch or arrowroot starch.

Simply whisked method: Instead of creaming together the butter, we’ll melt the butter until liquid, and whisk together with the sugar, dairy free yogurt, and vanilla extract and paste. Then add in the dry ingredients, and pour in the vegan buttermilk as you gently whisk JUST until the dry ingredients are incorporated (it doesn’t have to be a super smooth batter- DONT over mix). Then proceed onto the baking step!

Make sure that you add in a tablespoon of arrowroot powder or cornstarch if using gluten free flour. This will give the flour more like a cake flour texture when baked- very tender and moist!

If you use coconut sugar, your cake will be slightly tanner in color- but still delicious!!

Applesauce substitute: If you’re having a hard time finding applesauce in stores, you can also swap in your favorite dairy free unsweetened yogurt instead. You’ll use an equal amount. Please make sure that the yogurt has come to room temperature.

Storage: Any leftovers you have can be sliced and then stored in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days. Additionally, you can freeze the cake, and let it thaw in the fridge for 4 hours when you’re ready to enjoy again! You can also leave this cake at room temperature for up to a day if covered and stored in an airtight container.

Be sure to read the full post for all of my tips and suggestions!

For a vegan vanilla cake made with just oat flour, check out my vegan gluten free vanilla cake recipe.