Fresh Strawberry Cake

This Fresh Strawberry Cake features loads of ripe berries and a light whipped cream frosting…making it the perfect summer dessert!

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Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!

Some of the best food I’ve ever eaten was cooked in a parking lot.  I kid you not.  After college, I moved down to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and holy cow do they know how to cook down there on the bayou!  I was born in Texas and grew up in the Carolinas, so I’ve tasted my fair share of delicious Southern food.  But I was in for a surprise when I moved to southern Louisiana.  

I was in Cajun food heaven!  To this day, the best fried fish I’ve ever eaten was cooked in the parking lot outside of LSU’s Tiger Stadium.  That same parking lot was also where I first tried alligator. LSU was playing the Florida Gators, so it was entirely appropriate that we fried up some alligator bites that day.  It was pretty good actually.  It tasted like chicken.

Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!

One of the coolest things about living in the deep South is how well everything grew.  I planted some pepper seeds outside of my apartment during my first year there.  That plant grew to about 4 feet tall and was loaded with hundreds of tiny, red peppers.  I have no idea what the pepper was, but I know that just touching a sliced edge of the pepper to your tongue would make your tongue go numb for at least 10 minutes.  But on the other end of the spicy scale, Louisiana is known for its’ strawberries.  Thanks to the warm weather, strawberry season starts early down there…and this Fresh Strawberry Cake is one of my favorite uses for fresh strawberries!

What do I miss the most about southern Louisiana?  I’m tempted to say it’s the weather since I now live in upstate New York where the winter seems like it lasts longer and longer every year.  I remember wearing shorts on New Year’s Day in Baton Rouge.  Shorts!  But I’d have to say that the food is hands down the thing I miss the most.  I developed a serious love for Cajun food, and I’ve posted some of favorites here in the past.  (Shrimp Etouffee, Creole Red Beans & Rice, Mardi Gras Cinnamon King Cake…the list goes on…a classic New Orleans Muffaletta Sandwich…and on…)

Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!Fresh Strawberry Cake

But one of my favorite treats from Louisiana that I miss the most was actually not Cajun at all.  A local bakery in Baton Rouge made a famous strawberry cake that folks would go crazy about every Spring!  This cake was every bit as good as advertised, too.  It featured layers upon layers of white cake topped with a light strawberry frosting made with chopped, fresh strawberries.  It was basically the best strawberry shortcake I’ve ever eaten!  Not surprisingly, the bakery kept the recipe for this cake closely guarded, so this is my attempt at recreating this delicious dessert.  To be honest, it’s not far off.  I should know.  I ate a few of those strawberry cakes during my years in Louisiana.

Packed with one of the classic flavors of summer, a slice of this Fresh Blackberry Cake is the perfect treat for the end of a hot day!
Blackberry Cake

**Update** I recently made a similar version of this cake using blackberries instead of strawberries.  It turned out great!  I used readers’ comments from this post to slightly tweak the recipe.  If you love blackberries, then give this Blackberry Cake a shot!

Did you make this Fresh Strawberry Cake at home?  Leave a comment!  Or snap a photo and tag me on Instagram (@Spicedblog).  Happy baking!

Looking for more tasty cake recipes?  Check out some of these other favorites:

Blackberry Cake
Maple Walnut Cake
Southern Pecan Praline Cake
Red, White and Blue Cheesecake Cake
Fresh Strawberry Cake Roll

Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!

Fresh Strawberry Cake

Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It’s PERFECT for summer!!
4.92 from 25 votes
Print Pin Rate
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Assembling Time: 20 minutes
Total Time: 45 minutes
Servings: 16 slices

Ingredients

For the Cake

For the Frosting

  • See separate recipes for frosting below

Instructions

For the Cake

  • Grease and flour (3) 8” or 9” round cake pans; set aside. Preheat oven to 350°F.
  • Using a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir until well combined; set aside.
  • Using a countertop mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (~4-5 minutes on medium speed). Add the egg and egg whites; mix on low speed until well combined.
  • Add half of the flour mixture to the bowl; mix on low speed until well combined.
  • Add the milk, sour cream, vanilla extract and almond extract; mix on low speed until well combined.
  • Add the remaining flour mixture; mix on low speed until well combined. (Tip: Don’t forget to scrape down the sides of the bowl to ensure all ingredients are fully mixed.)
  • Divide the batter evenly between the 3 cake pans. Bake at 350°F for 20-30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
  • Let cakes cool in pan for 5 minutes before turning out onto a cooling rack until completely cool.

For the Frosting

  • Make either the Original Frosting or the Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting (both recipes below). Note: Some readers have had trouble with the Original version being too loose of a frosting. I have personally never had this happen, but I have included a basic cream cheese frosting recipe here as well. Feel free to make whichever frosting you’d like…both are delicious!

To Assemble the Cake

  • Slice ⅓ of the strawberries into thin slices; set aside. Dice the remaining strawberries into smaller pieces.
  • Place one layer of cake on a large plate. If using the Original Frosting recipe, spread a layer of diced strawberries on top of the cake and then top with frosting. If using the Cream Cheese Frosting recipe, proceed with frosting the top layer of cake. Repeat this step with the 2nd and 3rd layers of cake and more frosting.
  • Using an offset spatula, frost the sides of the cake. (Note: If using the Original Frosting recipe, it is helpful to refrigerate the frosting for about 20-30 minutes before frosting the sides of the cake.)
  • Slice the remaining strawberries and garnish the top of the cake with the slices.

Notes

**Updated 7/7/2017** A number of readers have noted that the Original Frosting recipe was too loose for frosting. This recipe had diced strawberries folded into the frosting. I have played with a number of ways to thicken this frosting, but the addition of the liquid from the strawberries is difficult to overcome. To make this recipe more “foolproof,” I suggest just sprinkling the diced strawberries in between each layer of cake and then topping with the frosting. The frosting will still be delicious, and each bite of cake will have that fresh strawberry taste! If you want to get creative, you can press diced or sliced strawberries into the sides of the cake, too. I have remade this recipe using this method here at home, and it works great. Give it a shot!
A reader recently suggested making/serving this cake in a 13×9 baking pan. That would definitely solve any possible issues with looser frosting as you wouldn’t need to frost the sides of the cake if it is served this way.
Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!

*Updated* Original Frosting

4.92 from 25 votes
Print Pin Rate
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Servings: 16 servings
Calories: 251kcal

Ingredients

Instructions

For the Strawberry Frosting

  • Using a clean bowl, beat the heavy cream on high speed until stiff peaks form. Place bowl in the refrigerator to chill.
  • In a separate bowl, beat the cream cheese, powdered sugar and vanilla extract until smooth and well combined.
  • Fold ⅓ of the whipped cream into the frosting and gently stir until well combined. Fold the remaining whipped cream into the cream cheese mixture; gently stir until well combined.

Notes

A reader noted in the comments that she uses whipped topping (i.e. Cool Whip) to make this cake, and it has always worked well. I haven’t personally tried that yet, but I can totally see how it would work as whipped topping is more stable than whipped cream. If you give this one a shot with whipped topping, let me know how it turns out!
Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

4.92 from 25 votes
Print Pin Rate
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Servings: 16 servings
Calories: 321kcal

Ingredients

Instructions

  • Using an electric mixer, cream together butter and cream cheese until smooth.
  • Add vanilla extract and powdered sugar 1 cup at a time, mixing after each addition.
  • Using a spatula or large spoon, stir in diced strawberries.

Notes

A reader made a great observation that dicing the strawberries could lead to too much liquid coming out of the berries. If your strawberries are particularly ripe or juicy, consider slicing them or chopping in larger pieces to minimize the amount of liquid that they produce. Another idea is to simply not mix the berries into the frosting but instead make the frosting without the strawberries and then sprinkle the berries on top of the frosting once it’s been added to the cake.
Fresh Strawberry Cake | This cake features loads of fresh strawberries and a light whipped cream topping. It's PERFECT for summer!!

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455 Comments

  1. This looks great. We made a strawberry cake for my hubby’s birthday a few years back, and my mother still talks about it. (We cheated and used a box mix….don’t tell anyone…we all know scratch cakes are best!)
    We put strawberries in the middle, like you did here. It was great.

    (I think I will skip the alligator though….)

    1. Haha…thanks, SueAnn! Strawberry cakes are amazing…they’re the perfect way to welcome in the warmer temps! But you totally need to try gator…it’s actually pretty good.

        1. Absolutely it will still work, Jules! Just make sure your bowl is big enough for the cake batter and then for the frosting…but you’ll be fine. I hope you enjoy the cake! 🙂

        2. You have got to be talking about Ambrosia Bakery! I live in Mississippi & travel frequently to Baton Rouge as my son & his family live there. You are absolutely positively RIGHT! Their Strawberry cake is phenomenal. Thank you for recipe because I have so much wanted to try it!!!

          1. I am indeed talking about Ambrosia Bakery, BJ! It’s been many years since I’ve visited Ambrosia (gosh…10 years now), but their strawberry cake was always a favorite. I didn’t have their recipe, so I set out to create a similar version. This recipe is now a summertime favorite for us! I hope you enjoy it! Thanks so much for commenting!

      1. This cake was good but my frosting was so thin that everytime I would slice a piece the top layer would slide to one side! I even placed frosting in refrigerator overnight and had added an extra 8ozs. of cream cheese. And I did whip the heavy cream where it was very stiff, one step away from making butter. Really disappointed with the waste of time and money.

        1. I’m sorry you had that experience, Txsch! As you can see in the photos, I didn’t have the same experience myself. However, a number of other readers have commented about the thinner frosting which is why I’ve added some helpful tips. It appears that folks are having better results now! As you know, baking is an experiment. I do hope you try this one again!

          1. I make this frosting for almost all of my cakes and cupcakes. Beating the cream cheese too much will cause the frosting to be runny and thin. Only mix until the sugar and cream cheese are combined before mixing to blend with the stiff whipped cream.

          2. The picture shows a three layers cake but instruction call for two layers. Which is it? What are the measurements to make this a three layer cake?

          3. Hey Leo! The recipe listed is for 2 layers, so just multiply it by 1.5x for the 3-layer version. Happy baking! 🙂

          1. Hi David for the original strawberry cream cheese frosting this work very well:
            1 cup heavy whipping cream
            2 packages (8 oz each) cream cheese, softened at room temp

          2. Excellent! Thank you so much for the note, Marimar. I love making this cake, but since a handful of folks have had problems with it, I’m thinking about posting a new “fool-proof” version of it. I’ll use these proportions as a starting point for the new experiment. I really appreciate you coming back to share this one! 🙂

          1. Hey there, Rebecca…I’m so sorry to hear that this frosting didn’t work for you. I actually just remade this frosting (and updated the recipe) less than a week ago. It is a looser frosting than say a traditional buttercream frosting, but it will work for frosting the cake (assuming the whipped cream was whipped to very stiff peaks first). With that said, I am still playing around with some other ideas for how to make this frosting light in texture but even stiffer. Stay tuned!

      2. I was so excited to make this cake. It is a bit labor intensive, but well worth it (cake portion only). The frosting I made was the cream cheese frosting. Unfortunately, when you add the strawberries, it’s a soupy mess. I even refrigerated the frosting thinking that would help it set up. It looked absolutely nothing like the frosting in your images which was quite disappointing. If I were to make this again, I would add the strawberries by sprinkling them on top of a cut slice. There’s just no way to extract the water that strawberries give off in advance.

        1. Hey Danielle! To be fair, the pictures in this post are of the original frosting recipe as opposed to the cream cheese version. However, I have made the cream cheese version twice myself, and it didn’t end up soupy. I really do feel bad that your version didn’t come out like anticipated. 🙁 However, your advice about sprinkling the berries on top of the cake is perfect. In fact, I’ve adjusted the recipe above to reflect that advice. Also, another reader recently suggested making this cake in a rectangular baking pan and then sprinkling the diced/sliced berries on each layer before adding the frosting. That would help counteract the additional liquid without making the frosting too loose. Either way, I do hope you enjoyed the taste of this cake! For me, it’s a classic summer dessert! Thanks so much for the feedback. Have a great rest of your weekend!

      3. Hi David!

        I absolutely love this cake! I make it once a year for my husbands birthday and it’s his favorite! I thought I remembered using cake flour though? Has the recipe changed? Thanks so much !

        Jill

        1. Hey Jill! Thank you so much for the kind words. You are indeed right that the original recipe used cake flour. Over the years, I’ve had a number of people say the recipe wasn’t working for them, so I reworked it a bit on my end. Of course, as soon as I reworked it, I started getting a bunch of comments from folks (like you!) who said they loved the original. So to solve that problem, I reposted the original one here: http://spicedblog.com/original-strawberry-cake I hope this helps, and I’m really glad you enjoy this cake…it’s one of our favorites around here, too! 🙂

      4. 5 stars
        Have made this cake a couple of times and it is delicious. We’ve had the same issues as others with the strawberries weeping, but we just call it Chernobyl cake – it’s a favorite even with “soft” frosting

        1. Thanks so much for taking the time to leave a comment, Wendy! I think you nailed it – the sugar in the berries causes the frosting to weep. The odd thing is it doesn’t do it every time. Maybe it has something to do with how whipped the cream is or maybe how sweet that particular batch of berries? Either way, we love this cake, too! Also, that’s a great name – Chernobyl Cake! 🙂

    2. Two years ago, I was searching for a cake recipe on Pinterest. I checked the recipe out and decided to make this cake. Best decision ever! Everyone loved this cake! Everyone! It came out perfect, even the cream cheese frosting. Unfortunately, I did not save the recipe and so here I was searching again for the recipe and low and behold- I found it! Thank you for sharing the recipe and I will make sure to save it this time 🙂

      1. Awesome! I am so glad you stumbled back across this recipe, Serena. It really is a fun one to make…especially in the summer when fresh strawberries are plentiful. I hope you enjoy this one as much as you did the first time! 🙂

    3. 5 stars
      I made this for my sister’s birthday in February (it was hard to find good strawberries but I managed). It was so good that my brother-in-law requested the same cake for his birthday next week! I used the original frosting recipe but added 1 Tbl of Wilton’s clear piping gel to stabilize the whipped cream. This allowed me to transport it 1 1/2 hours to her house and didn’t change the flavor at all. It was divine! With better strawberries, I can’t wait to taste it next week!

      1. 5 stars
        Interesting! I appreciate you sharing that tip about Wilton’s clear piping gel. I know other readers will probably appreciate that as well. 🙂 I’m so glad this cake turned out so well! It’s definitely a good one as we head into fresh strawberry season here. Happy baking, my friend!

      2. I just made this cake. It is wonderful. I combined the cream cheese frosting and folded the whipped cream and strawberrie in. It is the best cake. Thank you for sharing.

        1. Awesome! I’m so glad you liked this cake, Ann. It’s a yearly favorite here every summer. And cool idea about combining the 2 frosting recipes into 1. I’ll have to try that next time! 🙂

    4. 5 stars
      I made the cake last week and froze until yesterday. I added the strawberries to the updated frosting recipe after reading several posts. It was a big hit! So delicious! The cake froze beautifully until I was ready for it a week later!

      1. Interesting! So glad to know this cake (without frosting) freezes well, Kim. I really appreciate you stopping back by to share this, and it makes me really happy that the cake was such a big hit. Thank you!! 🙂

  2. Dude, this cake looks AMAZING! And that top photo is stunning! Love that you made a strawberry cream cheese frosting. Man, I want this cake right now!

    …and about that cold upstate weather. You COULD always move down to Long Island!

    1. Thank you so much, Chris! I made my wife get in there and be a hand model for that slice of cake. Her first response: but I didn’t paint my nails. Ah, things the wolfpack never needs to worry about! (Unless you’re into painting your nails. If you are, I won’t judge you too much.) And didn’t we settle this whole moving idea? I’m waiting to see your moving truck roll down my street any day now!

  3. I love Cajun food too, although I am a total northerner! I also did not know that aside from Cajun food, Louisianna was strawberry country! David this cake is beautiful. It is absolutely perfect. While stawberries are usually fantastic on their own, this might be my favorite way to eat them up!

    1. I know, Tanya! The hardest part about making this cake is using all of those delicious strawberries that I could just eat plain. And yes, strawberries grow like crazy down there in Louisiana. I think it has something to do with the coast and sandy soil. In fact, Abita (a Louisiana brewery) makes a Strawberry Beer that comes out in late-March/early-April every year. If you like beer, you should totally look for it next year…I’ve found it in a couple places here in upstate New York…and I always grab up as much as I can!

    1. Thank you so much, Jennifer! I’m pretty sure I did some damage on that bad boy already…I had to send 1/2 of it with my wife to her work so that I didn’t eat the whole darned thing!

      1. Hi David! I noticed the recipe is for three cake pans, if I just wanted to make a double layered cake, how would the measurement change?

        Thank you so much!

        1. Hey Jamie! To make a double-layered cake, I would recommend just cutting everything to 2/3 of the original amount. The baking proportions and time won’t change at all since you’re still using individual cake pans…just 2 instead of 3. 🙂 The only tricky ingredient to scale back is the eggs, and I would just use 1 whole egg + 3 additional egg whites. I hope this helps, and I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do!

  4. It’s true, Louisiana food is arguably one of the best in the country. I adore the Muffaletta, it’s like my fave sandwich.
    Great looking cake man BUT ….LSU Tigers? Seriously? :/

  5. I don’t get rich flavor in cakes, I always get something wrong in my Mom ‘s birthday I used all-purpose flour with cornstarch , and sift both 4 times, but I do not know why my cakes not taste like cake, have a dry appearance , and taste like bread, is unfortunately nothing wet , I tried various recipes, but if I add yeast the cake tastes like pizza, if I use the box of cake flour already prepared, the cake is crumbling, if I use all-purpose flour, the cake be dry and tastes like a bread, if I use large cake pan the cake is wet at the center , I use small cake pans, but some of the cakes are dry much , one of the cakes was very stale, and I had to use it in tiramisu, for moisten the cake . might not are adequately cakes recipes because USA have a different sea level unlike in the north of Mexico, or what type of flour should be used, because in the pictures of the recipes cakes are soft and spongy , but I don’t get cakes same, you could give me some tips please, thanks so much

    1. Hey Alice! Great question. I highly recommend using cake flour for cakes. It sounds like you’ve tried making your own cake flour, so I would check your proportion of flour to cornstarch. (I have a tip in the recipe above for that.) Better yet, try to purchase cake flour and use that instead of making your own. (I personally recommend King Arthur Flour, but I don’t know if you can get King Arthur in northern Mexico.) Also, it sounds like your cakes are almost always dry. This could be a lot of things, but I would double-check your baking temperature and time. Also, you might consider adding sour cream to the cake…this really helps to moisten it and keep it from being too dry. Give that recipe above a shot and see what you think. It’s a little bit on the denser side (almost pound cake-ish), but I like that because it works really well with the very light frosting. I hope this helps…good luck!!

      1. I too had the same problem with the cake. Very dry. I also used the ap flour and added the cornstorch with the correct measurements. Was disappointment with my cake. Could not find cake flour. Not sure what I did wrong. I love to bake and don’t usually have problems like this with a recipe. Any suggestions.

        1. I’m sorry you had that experience, Nelda! While this cake is dense (I did this on purpose as I wanted it be similar to Strawberry Shortcake), I’ve never had it turn out dry. As far as recommendations, the best way to combat dryness in cakes is to reduce the ingredients that absorb moisture and make sure not to overbake the cake. I’ve actually seen a wide variety of proportions for the cornstarch trick, so I’m going to guess that that could be the culprit here. If you can’t find cake flour, then try making this with all-purpose instead. It will change the texture slightly, but it’s a minor change. Since I can’t be there in the kitchen with you, I have no idea about the climate, oven, ingredients and materials. Most likely it’s not an error on your part…but it’s always good to double-check the details! If you are willing to do a little experimenting, you could always replace some of the butter with oil. That’s sure to yield a moister cake! Sorry the cake didn’t turn out perfectly, Nelda!

    2. I was never able to bake cakes well until I got a job at a bakery and made cakes every day. After a while I noticed that I had to be in a very relaxed state of mind to make the Gugelhups come out just right. Now the same is true of bread baking. Go slow, breathe a lot, and trouble shoot as you go. Don’t rush it into the oven. Of course, this really helps you notice things like humidity and consistency and so forth.

  6. Wow! This looks amazing, David! Love strawberry and cream cakes, so I definitely need to try this one out! Love how buttery the cake layers are and that strawberry cream cheese frosting looks so delicious!

    1. Thank you so much, Jess! This cake is one of my absolute favorite cakes ever…I suspect it will be appearing in my house at the beginning of every summer! 🙂

  7. OMGah! Your layers are so PERFECT! That’s it… now I KNOW I have to move in next door! I need to borrow your steady hand and knife skills… and your smoker, and your rib sauce, and your… etc. 😉

    1. Haha! Thank you so much, Becca! I could totally use a hand finishing off some of this food, too. (I often have to send stuff with Laura to work just because we can’t eat it all here…and I HATE wasting food!)

  8. David, this cake looks beautiful! I love your photos. Those layers look perfect! Now, I’m craving some cake 😀 I love strawberries! We lived in Pensacola and would go to a Strawberry Festival every year. They had the best strawberry shortcakes. They would set up right along side the fields. It was awesome!

    1. Thank you so much, Cindy!! Man, I miss strawberry festivals…they had them all over the South. We can still get yummy strawberries up here, but it’s just not the same as the festivals. 🙂

  9. Your cake looks great. We like strawberries here too. Our family has a strawberry cake but it is made with angel food cake and whipped cream with strawberries. You can also use raspberries. This is our favorite. Strawberry are very versatile.

  10. This looks yummy – I made something which looked similar last summer using fresh cream mixed with crushed meringue & chopped strawberries as filling – I’m looking forward to trying this one 🙂

  11. This was delicious. I didn’t think you could improve on whipped cream on strawberries and shortcake, but you did. The whipped topping with the cream cheese was amazing. Thank you!

    1. Wow, you already made it!! Thank you so much for coming back and letting me know, Mary Ann. I’m so glad you enjoyed it. Now I think I need to make another round…I’m craving it again! 🙂

  12. That is definitely one reason why I love living in the South, lots of strawberries! Your cake looks amazing, love the strawberries in the frosting! Gorgeous, Take care, Terra

    1. Hey Caitlin! I used granulated sugar in the frosting. The sugar is mixed with the cream cheese, so you shouldn’t have any trouble getting them to mix together. Great question though! I’m updating the recipe right now to clarify the type of sugar. Thanks for visiting!

  13. I have eaten the cake from the very bakery you speak of in Baton Rouge and I also recreated it because it is my daughters favorite!! Was born and raised in Louisiana! <3

    1. Haha! Awesome, Rebecca! I love that cake from Baton Rouge…but Baton Rouge is a bit of a drive from upstate New York. When in doubt…just make it yourself, right? 🙂

  14. Bowls of strawberries and whipped cream are (apart from the sweltering temps – fingers crossed we hit 100) are some of my favorite things about summer! And David, your cake is exceptional – the frosting with whipped cream and cream cheese sounds phenomenal! I could just eat that without a cake involved…oh boy!

    1. Oh man, this cake was awesome, Shashi! I had to send about half of it in with my wife to work so that I wouldn’t eat the whole thing myself. I agree with you about whipped cream and strawberries…nothing beats it in the summer! But you want to hit 100°?!?!

    2. Ha ha! We just did exactly this! I made this cake for my mother’s birthday tomorrow and had some leftover Strawberries and frosting. The cake looks so amazing, I want to dig into it right now but the strawberries and frosting are a great substitute.
      Thank you for this great recipe.

          1. Ah! Thank you so much for the note. I’ll make a note in the recipe reflecting this. I’ve always used more cream but then over-whipped it…and it’s worked. But several other readers have had trouble with the original recipe, so I’ll definitely add your note in there right now. Thank you!! 🙂

  15. This cake is amazing and the directions are super easy to follow. I absolutely loved the cake and my 5 year old daughter said it was the BEST cake ever. Thank you

    1. Wow! Thank you so much, Jennifer. I can’t tell you how much it means for you to come back and let me know how much you enjoyed it. This cake is one of my favorites for the summer…and I’m honored that you and your daughter loved it!! 🙂

    1. Hey Ernesta! The frosting is mostly whipped cream, but I did use a little bit of cream cheese to thicken it up slightly. It is a loose frosting for sure, but I whipped the cream to heavy peaks and that worked well. Just make sure that you stir the whipped cream a bit before you stop whipping it…sometimes I find that it can be somewhat looser down at the bottom of the bowl. It’s a loose frosting, but certainly not too runny as long as you whip it long enough (just don’t whip so long that it turns into butter!) I hope this helps, and I hope you enjoy this cake…it’s one of my favorites!!

    1. Great question! There is nothing specific about strawberries, so I would think other fruits could work, too. My only concern is that peaches and cherries both have more juice in them. You may have to drain a bit of the juice out or balance it with more whipped cream to keep the frosting easier to work with. If you do try it with another fruit, let me know how it turns out! I love this cake, and I’m always down to try another version. 🙂

    1. Thanks, Phillip! I’m jealous that you were able to get out there and pick so many strawberries…I think this cake is an excellent use of them, though! 🙂

  16. Does anyone know if I don’t have a paddle or a stand mixer (just a regular hand mixer) will it still turn out? Or can I use my hand mixer instead?
    Thanks
    R

    1. Hey Rene! You can totally make this cake with a hand mixer or even mix it by hand. (I’d recommend the hand mixer just to make life a bit easier on your arm! You can indeed make whipped cream by hand, but it would take a LOT of whipping…)

  17. Hi David …. I made this cake today and it was SO awesome! I especially love the icing ….. my husband who normally doesn’t eat sweets ate 2 slices! It was a hit in my house to say the least ….. I have found my new favorite. Thanks for sharing the recipe! ;0)

    1. Wow! Thank you so much, Tonya…your comment just made my night. 🙂 That’s actually one of the reasons I love this cake so much, too…it’s sweet, but not too sweet at all. I’m so happy this is now a favorite for you. Enjoy!!

  18. Great recipe. I know the cake and bakery of which you speak. You really got it! I love Louisiana strawberries and my Tigers!

  19. This might sound like a stupid question, but this recipe is for a two layered cake, what if I wanted to make a three layer cake just like your absolutely gorgeous picture
    Cannot wait to make this!!!!

    1. Good question, Janet! I included a note right above the recipe about the 2-layer vs 3-layer cake. Basically just take the recipe and multiply it by 1.5 to get the 3-layer version. I hope you enjoy it…it’s one of my favorite summer cakes ever!!

  20. Hi! My almost 5 year old has requested a strawberry cake for her birthday and I am going to recreate this beauty tomorrow! I was planning on making three layers and 1.5 times the dry ingredients but will I have to do the same with the frosting? You know, since so many times you make frosting and it is just way too much. Thanks for your help!

    1. Hey Kate! I would recommend going 1.5 times on both the dry ingredients and the frosting, too. You *might* have a little left over, but I usually end up using it all…and I don’t feel like it’s over-frosted. Plus, this is a very light frosting (so different than standard “grocery-store birthday cake” frosting)…and I’m pretty sure I could eat it with a spoon if there was any leftover! Good luck with the cake today…and please let me know if your daughter liked it! I know it’s one of my favorite summer cakes. 🙂

      1. Hi David-the cake was fantastic. So fantastic. If I could only eat that frosting for the rest of my life I think I would be ok. I did not 1.5 times it (not enough ingredients) but I still had plenty of frosting leftover. Maybe I’m just a light froster? 🙂 My daughter loved it and my husband…oh my gosh, my husband has been eating it for breakfast the last couple of days. My youngest daughter turns 1 at the end of the month and there is a pretty good chance I will be making this cake again. So good!

        1. Yay! I’m so glad you enjoyed it. Good to know about the 1.5x on the frosting. I thought I had made extra frosting, but I could totally be mistaken about that, too. Either way, that frosting really is good enough to eat with a spoon…so light and flavorful! I love that your husband and daughters loved it, too. You totally made my day with this comment! 🙂

          1. I’d thought I would come back and tell you, my MIL texted me last week and said she had a hankering for this cake and wanted me to bring it to a family gathering the next day. I had neither the time nor all the ingredients to make it in such short notice but told her the next time I saw her, I would make it for her. Well, she is coming over on Tuesday and has already hinted she expects cake. Also, I think I made this cake a total of six times last summer!

        2. Wow! That is awesome, Kate! I think you have beat my record…6 times already this summer?? 🙂 Oh, and as a sneak peak: I’ve got a blackberry cake coming up this Friday that is largely based off of this strawberry cake. If you like blackberries, then get excited…it might be one of my favorite cakes I’ve ever made!!

          1. Oh no! Six times LAST summer. Making it today but I know it won’t be the only time I make it this summer! I can’t wait for the blackberry version; I will have to wait until late summer/early Autumn when blackberries are ripe here in the Pacific Northwest!

        3. Ohhh…that makes more sense, Kate! And I hear ya about blackberries. Ours aren’t ripe yet here, either. I grabbed a mix of fresh and frozen from the store to make the cake. 🙂

  21. I am VERY familiar with Ambrosia’s version of this cake. I have 2 Daughters who graduated from LSU. The oldest one used this cake as the groom’s cake at her wedding. Actually, Ambosia did her wedding cake as well…and delivered both of them to New Orleans. So….I’m making your recipe tomorrow for her birthday cake since it’s her favorite. Sounds delish. Thanks for sharing. Oh, and Geaux Tigers!!!!!

    1. Yes!! Geaux Tigers!! It’s awesome to hear from someone who knows this cake! It’s not Ambrosia’s recipe (that one is probably locked in a safe somewhere), but it’s a delicious strawberry cake. One of my favorite summer desserts. I hope you enjoy it! 🙂

  22. I really want to make this! I live at a high alltitude and was wondering if the cake would require high altitude adjustments?

    1. Hey Annette! This is a super delicious cake, so I hope you give it a shot! I’ve never tried baking it at a high altitude, though, so I can’t say for certain what (if any) changes would be needed. I am, however, a huge fan of King Arthur Flour, and they have a great High Altitude Baking Guide on their site (http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipe/high-altitude-baking.html) Perhaps check it out to see? If you do end up giving it a shot, come back and let me know how it turned out in case other folks have the same question! (I’d probably start with the recipe as is at first…and then adjust if needed for the 2nd time. But that’s just me!) Thanks for stopping by. 🙂

  23. Hi David. I want to make this cake for a friends birthday, and wanted to make a quarter or half double layer sheet cake. How much batter for each layer would I need, or would I need to double recipe for each layer. Also, how long would I bake the cakes for. Can’t wait to make this cake, it looks awesome. Thanks, Audrey.

    1. Hey Audrey! I’ve actually never made this cake in sheet layer form. The recipe makes about 12 cups of batter (2 9″ round pans) and a standard jelly roll pan (10″x15″x1″) uses around 14-15 cups of batter. So to be safe, I would probably make a 1.5x version of this recipe…you’ll probably have more than you need, but it’s better to be safe than sorry! As far as baking time, it will certainly be shorter than baking in the round cake pans, but I’m not sure what the exact time will be. I’d recommend starting with about 13-15 minutes and just keep a close eye on it while it bakes. I hope this helps! I’ve never made this cake in that form, but this is a close guess to at least get you started on the right path! Let me know how it turns out!!

        1. Hi David. Made the cake and I gotta tell you , it was a big hit. The frosting is awesome, and so easy to make. I didn’t need to double or do one and a half recipe for the cake, because it makes so much battery to began with. This is now my go to strawberry cake. Making it for my sister’s 53rd. Thanks again!!!

          1. Awesome!! I really, really appreciate you coming back and telling me, too. Reading your note is a great way to start a Monday morning. 🙂 I’m glad you enjoyed it…and now I’m craving it again, too. I might need to get back in the kitchen and make it again before the summer is over! 🙂

  24. Hi! I made this cake today (well, I made the cake last night and the frosting today) and I’m wondering if I may have done something wrong or maybe there is a trick I don’t know about because my frosting came out waaaaay to runny to spread on a cake. Had to start over again with the cream cheese steps and then just add some of the whipped cream mixture in until I had the right consistency which was still pretty loose (as you said above). I refrigerated the finished cake to help it set up some. Did I maybe not whip the cream long enough? It was definitely pretty stiff but there was just so much of it. Anyway, once I messed with my frosting it was delicious!

    1. Hey Liz! I’m sorry you had trouble with the frosting. It’s kinda hard to estimate the problem without being there to see the consistency of the frosting. I do know that you have to make sure the whipped cream is fully whipped…and not just loosely whipped. You want it to be really good and stiff (not whipped all the way to butter…haha…but stiff enough that it holds its shape easily). The recipe does make a lot of frosting, but I found that it worked well to balance out the thicker cake. This really is one of my all-time favorite summer recipes, and I feel terrible that it caused such difficulties on your first attempt at it! I guess the silver lining is that it worked out in the end? 🙂 Thanks again for visiting Spiced…I really appreciate it! Don’t hesitate to ask questions or leave comments if anything else comes up!

  25. I just made this cake and I’m waiting for it to cool so I can frost it! The tops I took off while leveling my cake were delicious so I’m so excited for the finished product! I was just wondering if this should be kept refrigerated or room temp? Wasn’t sure how the whipped topping holds up!

    1. Hey Sarah! I’m so glad you made this cake…I hope you enjoy(ed) the finished version. It really is one of my favorite summer cakes! Because of all the whipped cream in the frosting, you definitely should store this cake in the fridge. Let me know how the frosted version tasted! 🙂

        1. That looks delicious, Sarah! Thank you so much for the picture. I bet the Greek yogurt was an awesome addition to this recipe. The frosting looks great, but I see what you mean about whipping it just a little longer. I’ll go back and update the recipe with a note just for other readers. I’m really happy you enjoyed it…have a great weekend!!

  26. I tried this today and the frosting just kept melting and now Im so sad because I was so looking forward to this! I kind of want to cry!

    1. Odd! Was it really hot in your house, Lyndsy? The only other thing I can thing is maybe you needed to whip the heavy cream a bit more? Make sure to really whip that heavy cream until it’s pretty thick…if it’s too loose, then it definitely will “melt” when you frost the cake. I’m so sorry you had trouble with the frosting. Give it another shot? 🙂

  27. I’m excited to try out this cake…Can I make it the day before? Or is it best made fresh…worried about the frosting
    Thanks

    1. Hey Naomi! I would try to make the cake the day you serve it if possible. If needed, you could bake the cake layers the day before. Just wrap them tightly and refrigerate overnight. The frosting will certainly be better fresh, though. It doesn’t take very long to make…but just make sure you whip the heavy cream until very stiff (almost over-beat it, but just don’t turn it into butter!). I hope this helps…let me know how the cake turns out. It’s one of my favorite summer desserts!!

  28. Pingback: Delicious Duos
  29. So this is my first time at attempting to bake from scratch. I went crazy looking for heavy cream! Would it work with heavy whipping cream?

    1. Hey Monica! Heavy cream shouldn’t be that hard to find. Maybe just ask the folks at your local grocery store? Either way, this recipe will work just fine with heavy whipping cream. Heavy whipping cream has a little bit less fat content, but it should still whip up quite well. Just make sure to whip it until it’s really stiff…otherwise it will be too loose when you go to frost the cake. I hope you enjoy this cake…it’s one of my absolute favorites!! 🙂

    1. Thank you so much, Mel! Great question about the mascarpone cheese. I’ve never used mascarpone in this recipe, but I think it would work just fine. However, cream cheese is often a bit thicker than mascarpone, and the real purpose of the cream cheese in the frosting is provide some stability. With that in mind, you might need to add a bit of powdered sugar (or perhaps more granulated sugar) to thicken the frosting. Either way, I’d go with it! Make sure to whip the cream until its very stiff and then add the mascarpone. If the frosting is still too loose once it’s all made, then just thicken it up a bit before adding it to the cake. Sorry for the long-winded answer! Come back and let me know how it turns out!

  30. From Louisiana and my company orders the Ambrosia Strawberry cake for everyone’s birthday, so I get to eat it pretty regularly. I’ve decided to try out your recipe for a Soiree’ that I am having this Friday, and I want to know about how many servings you can get out of the 3 layer cake?

    1. Hey BryAna! I’m jealous that you get to eat that Ambrosia cake regularly. This cake is my own homemade version of it, but it’s one of my favorite cakes ever! As far as servings, you can easily get 16-18 slices out of the 9″ cake. You might be able to get more, but I’m a believer in the “I’d rather have too much than not enough” philosophy. I hope this helps! If you make this cake this weekend, come back and let me know what you think about it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! (Just make sure to really whip the whipped cream until it’s stiff…otherwise the frosting is too loose to stay on the cake.)

        1. The cake turned out great! My only regret is that I didn’t put enough icing between the layers; I was afraid that when I cut the cake, the icing would ooze out the sides. It would have tasted so much better, but I barely had any icing in between the layers. I still received a lot of compliments– one even asked me if I had bought the cake from Ambrosia. I made the cake the night before the party, and put it in the fridge overnight so that the icing was nice and firm.

          1. Yay! That is awesome, BryAna. I’m so glad the cake turned out well…I can’t believe someone asked if you got it at Ambrosia, too! I definitely understand what you mean about not putting enough frosting in between the layers. The refrigeration certainly helped with that I bet. And a good, sharp knife always helps there, too. Hopefully you’ll make the cake again sometime…and then you can add more frosting in between those layers. Thanks again for reporting back. I hope you have a great weekend! 🙂

        2. Hello I wanted to make this cake also but with the three layers. Did you make the three layer? If so, do you have the correct measurements after you increased the recipe?

  31. I am trying this cake tomorrow for my daughter’s birthday, with little forest animals on top. My mouth is watering. Don’t know if I can wait that long. I love just reading about Cajun food! You really have to be there to get real Cajun food.

    1. Haha! This is an awesome cake, Zada…I hope you like it! As the reader above pointed out, it might help to refrigerate the cake for a little bit before you slice it. (You might not be able to do overnight, but even an hour or two will help give you nice, clean slices.) My only other tip with this cake is to make sure to really beat the cream until it’s pretty stiff…otherwise it won’t hold up when you go to frost the cake. I absolutely love Cajun food. Since my wife and I live in upstate NY now, good Cajun food is hard to find…so I just have to make my own. Check out some of my Mardi Gras posts for some of my favorites. (Click on Recipes up at the top and then click Mardi Gras on the side menu.) Thanks for commenting, and I hope your daughter loves this cake!!

  32. This looks great! I just have a question about the amount of cake batter this recipe makes. In the picture, there’s 3 layers, but the recipe only calls for 2 cake pans. Would the batter amount be enough to fill 3 9-inch cake pans?

      1. Glad you saw the note about the layers, Milly! I wanted an extra tall Strawberry Cake when I made this one, so I multiplied the recipe by 1.5x to get that extra layer. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as I do!! 🙂

      2. Hello I want to make this cake with three layers also, do you still have the recipe after you increased it?

  33. Dude. This must be meant to be… I’m sitting here in my kitchen in Baton Rouge, wondering how on earth I will be able to pull off a stand-out strawberry cake (which I have never made), for my in-laws… and where do I land? Right here where the author of the recipe knows EXACTLY the cake I have in mind when I say I want to make a slammin’ strawberry cake! I’m pretty sure I know precisely which bakery you speak of, and I’m excited to give your version a try! Thanks so much for sharing!!!… and thanks for making me want some blackened ‘gator for lunch. 😉

    1. Hahaha! How perfect is that, Sarah? I miss Baton Rouge quite a bit…which is what led me to create this recipe. This cake does take a bit of effort slicing all of the strawberries, but the result is totally worth it. The main tip that I can offer is just to make sure to really whip the whipped cream for the frosting. If you make a “looser” whipped cream, then it just won’t hold up when you go to frost the cake. I’d recommend almost over-whipping it. Don’t turn it into butter or anything, but whip it until it really gets thick.

      As far as 4 layers? Hmmm…I honestly don’t know that you would need it. We did 1.5x for these pictures, and that was a mighty big cake. Of course, it is the holidays…so maybe you should just go big. Haha! Just kidding, I would truthfully go with a 1.5x recipe and do 3 layers. I think the cake would hold up with 4 layers, but I don’t know if you’d be able to cut it into neat slices. If you’re planning on making this cake for Thanksgiving, then you might want to go ahead and make it today…or else Thanksgiving morning could get a little crazy! I hope you enjoy this cake…if you think about it, come back and let me know how it turned out!

      P.S. Could you send me some blackened gator? For some odd reason, it’s difficult to find here in upstate New York. 🙂

        1. I am totally too late to answer this question. But yup, that’s exactly what I did! I just beat that egg and then only used half of it. I hope that the cake turned out awesome…it’s probably done by now!

          1. Yes, the cake is done, and perfect! But I’m having problems with my frosting. It is just not firming up enough. Even after sitting in the fridge for over an hour. I wonder if I beat the cream cheese too much? It tastes AMAZING, haha! I could eat it by the spoonful. But I’m scared to try and frost the cake. Do I need to start over, or is there something I can do to save it?

        2. Hmmm…well, it is a looser frosting (not like a thick buttercream at all). I don’t think you can overbeat cream cheese…my guess would be that the heavy cream may have still been a little loose. So I have 2 suggestions: (1) If you haven’t added the strawberries to the frosting, then you can try whipping it a bit more. Use a hand mixer if you have one…otherwise your hand might fall off. Haha. If that doesn’t work, or if the strawberries are already in the frosting, then (2) just turn it into a “naked” cake. Leave the sides of the cake unfrosted and put extra frosting in the layers and on top. Then just let the frosting “ooze” (sorry, that’s not a particularly appetizing word, but it’s the best one I can come up with) out the sides. The picture isn’t the best, but I did something similar here: http://spicedblog.com/olive-oil-cake-with-lemon-cream-filling.html It would totally still work…and it will absolutely still taste good! I hope I got this back to you in time! Let me know how it turns out…and Happy Thanksgiving!

          1. Oh, a “naked” cake sounds awesome! I’m about to check on the frosting now after refrigerating it over night… I whipped my cream pretty well with my kitchen aid stand mixer (a spoon could stand up in it without falling, lol), so I don’t think that was it. I THINK it may have been the frozen berries I used. They’re out of season, so I grabbed frozen ones, chopped them in my food processor, defrosted them, and strained them a bit. But maybe not quite enough? Maybe they were too juicy and made my frosting run. Oh well! I’m going to make the best of it and enjoy this holiday!

            And you do the same! Thanks so much for commenting back, totally nice of you! Happy Turkey Day!

        3. Ah! I didn’t even think about the liquid from the frozen berries. It sounds like you whipped the cream enough for sure, so I’m guessing that extra liquid may be the culprit. Next time, you might even press the berries with paper towels to really soak up the extra liquid. I didn’t make this cake for today…but now I am kinda wishing that I did! I hope you enjoy yours, and I hope you and your family have a great Turkey Day! 🙂

          1. I promise this is my last time bothering you! The cake was well-loved by the birthday boy and my family. 🙂 THANK you for such great feedback! I went out to get some fresh berries this morning and I only used about half of the cream cheese and berry mixture with my whipped cream. The other half I spread directly between the layers. It turned out beautifully! Much appreciation and well wishes for the rest of the holiday season. 🙂

        4. You aren’t bothering me at all, Sarah! I’m so glad the cake turned out well. I didn’t even think about the liquid from the frozen berries…it sounds like the fresh berries worked out well, though. Have a great long weekend, and don’t hesitate to ask if you have any other questions! 🙂

      1. Just made mine. Love it!! Cant wait until tomorrow. My frosting does not seem stiff enough. It should be refrigerated right?? Im Thinking that it may thicken up over Night.

        1. Hey Olivia! The reader above had almost the same question. The trick with whipped cream frosting is you really have to whip it good (no Devo pun intended!). You don’t want to overwhip it into butter, but you want that cream to really be stiff so that it holds up when you frost the sides of the cake. I don’t think it will really stiffen up overnight, but I could certainly be wrong. I have 2 suggestions here: (1) if you haven’t added the strawberries to the frosting, then you can try whipping it a bit more. Use a hand mixer if you have one…otherwise your hand might fall off. Haha. If that doesn’t work, or if the strawberries are already in the frosting, then (2) just turn it into a “naked” cake. Leave the sides of the cake unfrosted and put extra frosting in the layers and on top. I made a similar style cake here: http://spicedblog.com/olive-oil-cake-with-lemon-cream-filling.html so that might give you a bit of an idea. Either way, it will taste delicious! I hope I was able to get this comment back to you in time…and I hope your cake turns out amazing. It’s one of my all-time favorite cakes, so I hope it works for you, too! Come back and let me know how it turns out…and Happy Thanksgiving!!

    1. Hey Ivonne! We’ve definitely worked on this cake for a couple of days before without noticing any issues with the strawberries. I guess if your strawberries are SUPER ripe, then you might not have as long. I think you should be good here. 🙂 Of course, the fresher the cake, the better it tastes…so try to make this cake as close to possible for when you’ll serve it. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do!! 🙂

    1. Thank you so much, Alice! This is one of my favorite summer cakes of all time…in fact, maybe I need to make another one of these soon to will the snow outside to melt. 🙂

  34. Hi, David! I wanted to share with you my experience with this recipe. I wish I could share a picture with you, but I see no way to attach one here. 🙁

    In any case, my daughter’s 18th birthday was this past Sunday. She found your recipe on Pinterest & asked me to make this cake for her. I am not a baking novice, as I make her cake every year & then some, LOL, so I happily agreed.

    Below are my observations on the process & the end result for anyone that may be interested in making this.

    I made the cake on Saturday night, and made the regular recipe, not the 3-layer option. The process, though a little time-consuming, was a breeze. I had to add about 8 more minutes of bake time to the cakes because at the 36 minute mark, the cakes were still very wet in the middle. They came out lovely & a light, golden brown – not over-baked. They were allowed to cool in the pan, then transferred to a cooling rack.

    The frosting was a joy to make. Fun, fluffy, delicious! I would discourage anyone wanting to make the 3 layer version of this cake from upping the ingredients for the frosting, as this recipe made WAY more than enough to generously pile between the cake layers *and* frost the cake, as well as fill two cereal bowls to serve as dessert. *blush* LOL (Frankly, I just wanted to bury my face in the bowl – it was *that* good. LOL)

    Once the cakes were properly cooled & the frosting chilled, it was time to frost. This went relatively smoothly, though the frosting did begin to melt. This is definitely a cake that needs to be stored in the refrigerator, which I knew upon reading the ingredient list, but was verified upon actual creation. 🙂

    It’s been our tradition to take the cake with us to my daughter’s restaurant of choice, so after dinner, we began slicing & serving. IMMEDIATELY, we noticed how crumbly the cake was. I read someone mention above in the comments that theirs turned out more like cornbread than cake, and I will second that. This both felt, cut, & tasted more like sweet cornbread than cake. Crumbs ALL over the place; the cake did NOT stick together when sliced into bite-sized pieces with a fork. I had this experience once before – and it, too, was with the use of cake flour. We were expecting a more tightly-packed, dense cake, and although the frosting is what actually made the cake good, we were all disappointed a bit in the cake itself. I will say this: the overall cake gets better the longer it sits. I had a piece yesterday morning with my coffee, and the strawberries really poured more of their flavor into the frosting.

    Overall, I would DEFINITELY make this cake again; however, I would NOT use cake flour. Do you have suggestions or other ideas as to why this is so crumbly? Thank you so much! 🙂

    1. Hey C.A.! Wow, thank you so much for the detailed note. I’m really glad that you liked this cake, and I’m honored that your daughter selected it for her birthday cake this year. 🙂 I’m sorry to hear about how crumbly the cake turned out, though. I’ve made this cake several times, and it’s definitely a denser cake…but I’ve never had it completely crumble apart as you mention. I truthfully prefer the denser cake paired with this lighter frosting, but now I’m curious about changing it up a bit. You are indeed correct that cake flour could lead to a crumbly cake. I might give this a shot with all purpose flour next time. It’s almost Spring here in upstate New York (sort-of), and I’m sure I’ll be craving this cake pretty soon!

      Aside from the flour, another culprit that can cause cakes to be crumbly is too much sugar. Since you said you aren’t a baking novice, I won’t even ask if you measured the sugar accurately. 🙂 However, it might be worth a shot to reduce the sugar in the batter for this cake. I wouldn’t do much…maybe knock it back to 1 1/4 cups instead of 1 1/2? The only other thing that kinda makes me wonder is how you said this cake took an extra 8 minutes to bake. Overbaking a cake would cause it to crumble, too, but you said that it wasn’t fully baked at 36 minutes. I’ve never had that experience…but then again, that could be explained by something as simple as a slight difference in oven temperatures, you know?

      I’m really intrigued (and a bit sad) that your cake didn’t come out perfect! I want to get in the kitchen and make this again with all-purpose flour and a bit less sugar to see what happens. My cakes haven’t turned out crumbly in the past, but I am curious to see if these changes might lead to an even better cake, though. If you make this cake again before I do, then please report back! I’m an inquisitive guy, and I want to get to the bottom of this! (without eating 74 cakes, that is…haha) Thanks so much for leaving the comment. 🙂

      1. Hi, David! Thank you so much for following up with me. 🙂 Yes, we’re in Colorado, with the altitude, the baking needs to be adjusted slightly sometimes. I have to make slight time adjustments for nearly everything I bake because of that, which as a native Floridian, is annoying. LOL

        I definitely measured out the sugar correctly, because my daughter is at that stage (finally!) where she’s wanting to learn to cook – and bake, in particular, so I included her in the entire process with this cake & monitored her measuring. I’m sure she thought I was hovering, but I want her to learn properly. LOL

        The next time we make this, I’ll cut the sugar back & see about using something aside from cake flour, but I’d be very interested to hear your feedback on that, too, if/when you experiment as well! There is perfection *somewhere* in this cake for me, I just know it. And the frosting is just too good to NOT make it again. LOL! (Now you’ve got me thinking about fresh, ripe peaches for this, too…)

        I will say this: as of this morning, there’s not a single piece of the cake left, and I was a tad irked when I went to get a piece with my coffee, only to find that my daughter took the rest of it to school for her & her boyfriend to share. LOL!

        1. Oh! One other thing that we did that I wanted to mention, as I saw a commenter ask about the sweating of the strawberries. To avoid this, we did NOT decorate the cake until the morning after we made it. We sliced the strawberries at the same time that we were frosting the cake the night before, but we put them on a saucer & covered them with plastic wrap & refrigerated them so that they could “sweat”, if they were going to, on the saucer. That way, we could drain the juice, pat the slices dry, and decorate the cake without worrying about there being any strawberry juice accumulating on the top of the cake.

          As for the berries *in* the frosting, we experienced absolutely NO juice beyond the small amount released in the mixing process. 🙂

        2. Haha! I love the “there is perfection somewhere in this cake” thought. I do want to play with the recipe a bit, and I think I’ll go with the all-purpose flour and a touch less sugar. It might be a couple of weeks until I get to it, but it’s going to happen! I always loved this cake the way it is, but my wife says it reminds her too much of pound cake.

          So sad that the cake is all gone…but I guess it *was* for your daughter’s birthday. You can’t really be too mad that she snatched the last pieces, right? 🙂

          Good tips on the strawberries sweating…thanks for sharing! And your cake looks incredible…thank you SO MUCH for posting that photo. This discussion has totally inspired me to make another one of these cakes soon! Have a great day!

  35. Hi, this cake looks amazing. I’m making it this weekend for a birthday party. A few questions… I am going to make a sheet cake. 12×15. I saw the other posts about the amounts but I’m a little confused. Do I double the recipe and make 2 sheets? My other question is what percentage of milk do you use? I have little ones in the house so I have whole milk on hand. Thanks and looking forward to trying this out!

    1. Hey Liz! Thank you so much for the kind words…this is absolutely one of my favorite cakes! I have never made this as a sheet cake, though, so I don’t know exactly what to recommend as far as how much to make. I did a little quick math and the recipe above produces enough cake for 2 9″ rounds. This translates to only about 3/4 of a 12×15 sheet cake. Are you planning on slicing the sheet cake in half and then stacking the 2 halves? I’m thinking you’re going to probably want to double the amount of batter. I think the frosting amount should still be close, though, as it is a LOT of frosting.

      Whole milk will work perfectly for this recipe! I usually prefer baking with whole milk if I have the choice. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do. I apologize for not knowing the exact transfer amounts over to a sheet cake size. Let me know how it turns out!! 🙂

      1. Thanks, I think I’ll double it and then cut the sheet cake in half for the layers. I wasn’t sure if I should bake 2 cakes or just cut it. Cutting it seems easier. 🙂 Glad whole milk works, one less thing to get at the store! I’ll update how it goes… Thanks again!

        1. No problem, Liz! I also meant to add that you’ll just have to keep an eye on the cake as it bakes. Between doubling the volume but then going with a larger pan, I’m not sure where that leaves you in terms of baking time. I would just check it early and often! Good luck with the baking!!

          1. Hey Molly! Sadly, I’ve never lived in a high-altitude environment myself, so I can’t speak to the necessary changes. However, a couple of other readers have chimed in here over the years, so maybe take a look at what they said. They didn’t have exact measurements, but they did have good advice. Annette, “CNE” and “C.H.” have all commented about altitude, so just search the comments to see some thoughts. I hope this helps! And if you do end up baking this cake, I’d love for you to share the changes here for future high-altitude readers. Thanks so much, and happy baking!

  36. Born and raised Baton Rouge native here! I made this cake today and brought it to a farewell party for a friend who is about to move away. I was excited to find a “knockoff recipe” for the famous Ambrosia cake (I used to work at Baum’s myself, and the strawberry cake is the only thing I will touch from Ambrosia) The cake turned out beautifully, tons of leftover frosting that I’m going to use for shortcakes (and I was VERY generous in layering/frosting.) It tasted good… But as far as comparable to the original? I was very disappointed. The icing is so heavy with whipped cream you can hardly taste the cream cheese. And the cake tastes good, but it’s so dense! NOTHING like the fluffy cake layers from Ambrosia!

    Everyone at the party enjoyed the cake, but not a single Baton Rouge native made the connection that this was an attempt at the Ambrosia cake. As a shortcake, this is great. But I’m going back to the drawing board for THE strawberry cake. The cake layers on the original are much lighter and the frosting somehow doesn’t taste as much like straight whipped cream. But thanks for the inspiration!

    1. I’m sorry this cake didn’t hit the spot for you, Rebekah. As I’m sure you noticed, I readily pointed out that I do not have the recipe for the cake that you mentioned. Instead, I was simply inspired to create a strawberry cake that used loads of fresh berries in both the frosting as well as the cake. I played with this cake a good bit, and I personally enjoy it quite a bit. It’s one of my favorite cakes to make every spring! I’m sorry that you were disappointed, and I wish you the best of luck in your search for a copycat recipe.

  37. Hey! im im the process of making this cake and I was reading through the comments and I noticed that “whipping cream” is mentioned for use in the frosting while in the recipe it says heavy cream. I was wondering if there’s a difference?

    1. Hey Veronica! I apologize for not getting back to you while you were making this cake. So heavy cream and heavy whipping cream are very similar products. Heavy cream just has a bit of a higher fat content, so it’s preferred in certain recipes. However, since it’s just being used to create whipped cream for this frosting, that means that either one will work. I used heavy cream as I already had some in the refrigerator, but heavy whipping cream will work just as well, too. The key (and I’m sure you know this by now) is just to make sure to really whip the whipped cream until it is very stiff (almost overwhipped). That way it will hold up when you go to frost the cake. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do!! And happy Easter! 🙂

  38. This cake looks so yummy. I am making it for my daughter and nieces birthday. I wanted to make it in advance but was wondering if it needs to be refrigerated. Should I just make the cake part the night before and do the whipping and decorating the night of? I am going to start on the cakes now. Thanks!

    1. Hey Ruth! Since the frosting is almost entirely whipped cream, you do need to refrigerate the cake. However, you can bake the cakes early and either freeze them or wrap them tightly in plastic wrap…and then you can frost them on the day of the party. Still leave yourself enough time to make the frosting and decorate the cake…but that’s definitely the way to go to save time. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do!! Happy baking!

      1. The cake tastes great but I was not familiar with how the whipping worked with the heavy cream. I was afraid to make it too stiff and didn’t whip it long enough….probably a few minutes shy of making it stiff enough. The cake turned out droopy 🙁 It tasted yummy though. Next time I will whip a little longer. Thanks for getting back with me!

        1. Oh no! I’m so sorry to hear that, Ruth. As you’ve noticed, you really have to almost over-whip that frosting in order for it to hold up once the cake gets frosted. I’m glad you enjoyed the flavor though, and I hope you’ll make it again sometime! Have a great rest of the day!!

    1. Hey Kristin! I’ve never used powdered sugar in this recipe, but I’m thinking it might work. You may need to play with the amounts, though, since powdered sugar packs a real punch of sweetness. If you do try it out with powdered sugar, then let me know how it turns out! (The real key to the frosting is making sure to whip that cream until it is VERY stiff…almost overwhipped. I said it above, but I figured it’s worth repeating.) I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do…it’s almost time for us to make another one now that strawberry season is coming in! 🙂

    1. Hey Caroline, good eye! You should see a Baker’s Note right above the recipe where I described that I made a 1.5x version of this recipe in order to get the 3 layers you see in the photos. The recipe as listed makes 2 layers. (You could probably get away without increasing the frosting amount as the recipe makes a lot…but then again, there’s no such thing as too much frosting, right?) I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do!!

  39. Hi David… First let me say your cake looks amazing. I used to make a cake very similar to this every 4th of July to serve as the desert for my yearly 4th of July BBQ. The only difference is I did not add strawberries to my frosting. I just frosted the top of the bottom layer and then put a layer of sliced strawberries. Then I put on the top layer and frosted it and the sides and topped the top of the cake with another layer of sliced strawberries leaving about a 1″ open space around the edge so I could pipe a decorative border. I also piped a border around the bottom of the cake and placed strawberry slices around the top of that. It was always a hit… Everyone loved it!

    The frosting recipe I used is VERY similar to yours. It is a recipe I came across years ago. It’s called, “Stable Whipped Cream Frosting”. I think this recipe would work very well for you with the strawberries added and would be a little stiffer and more stable than the frosting recipe your using. Just an idea… Here is the recipe if your interested in giving it a try…

    “STABLE WHIPPED CREAM FROSTING”
    This is SOO delicious
    It WON’T melt at room temperature like regular whipped cream!
    It’s VERY stable.
    Its wonderful used for frosting a cake or even dipping fruit in it!
    Not TOO sweet.
    Very versatile!
    **This recipe makes 5 cups**
    1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened (reduced-fat is fine)
    1/2 cup white sugar
    1 teaspoon vanilla extract
    1/2 teaspoon almond extract
    2 cups of heavy cream
    DIRECTIONS:
    Combine the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla extract and almond extract in a large mixing bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer and mix on medium speed until smooth.While the mixture is still whipping, slowly pour in the heavy cream. Stop and scrape the bottom of the bowl a few times and continue whipping until the frosting has thickened to a spreadable consistence will hold stiff peaks. If you plan to pipe this frosting it will work best if you fill your piping bag(s) and refrigerate for an hour or two before piping. Cake is best served after it has chilled in the refrigerator for a few hours. Be sure to refrigerate leftovers.

    1. Thank you so much, Barb! You are right in that the recipe above is very similar. It looks like it just has a bit less whipped cream…which would indeed lead to a bit more stable of a frosting. I’ve had good luck with this version, but I do have to over-whip the whipped cream in order for it to hold. I’ve seen a number of readers’ comments that the frosting is not holding up for them…and I think it’s because of the whipped cream. Your version would fix that! I’ll make a note up in my recipe about that as I do really want people to enjoy this cake! Thank you SO much for sharing…you are awesome. I hope you have a great weekend!!

    2. You can also make stabilized whip cream by putting knox unflavored gelatin in a couple teaspoons of warm water till slightly thickened and add when the whip cream starts thickening along with some powdered sugar. This will keep the whip cream from turning watery, I always do this when making no bake cheesecake. It really does work. I also find that cake flour does not raise as well. Husbands birthday is in April I always make him a strawberry cake (his favorite) this year I will make this one.

      1. Thank you for the tip about gelatin for the stabilized whipped cream, Tammy! I hope your husband enjoys this cake as much as we do around here. Have a great weekend! 🙂

  40. I am really looking forward to trying your cake recipe and adding the diced strawberries to the frosting. I just know that it will be amazing! Thanks for a great recipe!!! Happy baking… 🙂

  41. Wonderful recipe, the cake is delicious! Only comment is that you do not need to 1.5 the recipe to make three generous sized layers. I did this for the recipe and the frosting and had way too much leftover; I was able to make half a dozen cupcakes with the leftover batter and my layers were about an inch-an inch and a half thick! Also, I had at least 4 cups of whipped cream left over! Other than this, the recipe is amazing; it tastes like strawberry shortcake!

    1. Thank you so much, Kate! Good feedback about the sizes, too. Did you use a 9″ cake pan? I typically make just a single batch of this recipe and then make two layers. Either way, I’m glad you enjoyed it as much as we do! This cake just screams spring to me! 🙂 Also, is too much cake a bad thing? Haha…

  42. I made this cake last night and it was a huge Pinterest fail for me. Although, I will say a super delicious fail. My cake layers slipped and fell all over the place. It was a mess, but the best strawberry cake I have ever had. I was hoping I could get a tip. I assume I didn’t beat my whipping cream enough, but it said not to overbeat. I also let it set in the fridge for an hour before I put the cake together. I have no clue what I did wrong.

    1. Oh no! I’m so sorry to hear about the cake, Rachel. Based on what you said, I’m nearly certain that the whipped cream wasn’t whipped long enough. It’s hard to describe that as you really want to whip the whipped cream past what you would normally do…but you don’t want to go so far that it begins to turn into butter. You want it to really be quite stiff…like beyond stiff. Letting it rest in the fridge should also keep it stiff. I’m glad it was a super delicious fail, but I still feel terrible about the fail. I guess you’ll just have to make it again, huh? 🙂 Thank you so much for your comment!

  43. Thank you for this simple & delicious recipe; my 6 yr old son wanted a strawberry cake with strawberry frosting for his birthday cake & this one fit the bill perfectly! The only thing I changed was to add some fresh strawberry puree into the cake batter; about 3/4 cup’s worth – the color was a light pink with just a hint of that yummy strawberry flavor. No need for food coloring, which is what so many other recipes call for. Tomorrow I make the frosting but I just wanted to say thanks now before I forget; great recipe!

    1. Thank you so much for leaving this comment, Vicki! I’m always honored and humbled when someone makes one of the recipes that I post here. 🙂 That was a fun idea to add some fresh strawberry puree to the cake batter. I’ll have to try that next time I make this cake. Also, I’d note that the frosting recipe makes a lot of frosting! You’ll probably have leftovers, but then again…leftover frosting is never a bad thing, right? Also, make sure to really whip that cream until it is beyond stiff. Some other readers have commented that they’ve had trouble with the frosting being too soft, and I don’t want you to have the some problem for your son’s cake. I hope you guys enjoy it, and happy early birthday to your son!!

    1. That’s a great question, Helene! I guess you could use a bundt pan, but make sure to grease/flour it very well to prevent it from sticking. The only problem I see is that bundt cakes usually have a poured glaze-type frosting…and this frosting is more traditional in that the cake would need to be frosted. (Sorry for all the uses of frosting there, but I couldn’t figure out how to say it any better…haha!) So in short, yes, you can use a bundt pan…but I think another type of pan (brownie or rectangular cake) would be a better option. If you do give it a shot in a bundt pan, will you let me know how it turns out? Thanks so much, and I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do around here! 🙂

  44. i made this cake today and I wish I could show you how GREAT it came out!! I followed the directions just as you said… Best cake I have ever made! Thank you!

    1. Yay! Thank you so much for commenting, Lucine…it makes me so happy that your cake turned out great! I’ve had a hard time describing how to really whip that whipped cream so that it isn’t too loose once you frost the cake…but it sounds like you nailed it! This comment totally made my morning! 🙂

  45. Making this cake for an extreme strawberry lovers birthdaytoday. I baked the cakes last night, and made the frosting. I placed the gg on the fridge, this morning its a little to soupy. What can I do to thicken it? I hate to toss 20$ worth of frosting away.

    1. That’s a good question, Malia! I totally understand not wanting to throw it away. My guess is the whipped cream was not whipped enough, but I think it can be salvaged. My first attempt would be to try to whip it again. If that doesn’t work (due to all of the other ingredients in the frosting now), then you can certainly just add more cream cheese to thicken up the overall frosting. It will end up being slightly different than the recipe I posted as it will have more cream cheese flavor…but it can be saved! You could also try folding in some more whipped cream that has been over-beat until it’s super thick. (Like thick! Not creamy like whipped cream normally is.) That might help offset the runniness of the first batch. I hope this helps…let me know how it turns out!!

  46. wondering if this is truly meant for two cake pans like the recipe says? I’m confused since the picture shows this cake as three layers. Planning on making this for Mother’s Day!

    1. Hey Lauren! There is a baker’s note at the bottom of the recipe explaining that I made a 1.5x version of this cake for the 3 layers. Other readers have reported that they didn’t need to increase the amount of frosting as the 2-layer version made more than enough. I always say I’d rather have more frosting than not enough…but that’s just me! 🙂 Also, make sure to read through some of the comments about how long to whip the whipped cream for the frosting. The biggest “challenge” (if it’s really a challenge) to this cake is making sure to really get a very, very stiff whipped cream before adding remaining frosting ingredients. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do around here!!

  47. I was just wondering that if I doubled this recipe into a 13×9 sheet cake would I have to adjust the cook time??

    1. That’s a good question, Amanda! I think you might end up with slightly more batter if you double the recipe and then go 13×9. (Not much…just a cup or two.) However, because of that, you may need to adjust the cooking time a slight bit longer. I would start with the time listed above (~35 minutes), and I would start glancing at the cake around that time. My guess is you will need a couple minutes more, but nothing too crazy. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do!! 🙂

  48. Seriously delicious cake. My only problem was that I let my cream cheese get to warm cuz it was a hot day, so I look forward to trying this again in a temperature controlled environment. 🙂

    1. Ah, bummer on the cream cheese, Suzie! You might have been able to just toss it back in the fridge? Either way, I’m so glad you enjoyed this cake! I just made it again a couple of days ago for a party…it’s one of our favorite summer desserts around here! Thanks so much for your comment, too. 🙂

  49. This cake is Ah-mazing! I made this for my son’s 5th birthday and modified it very successfully to be egg free using egg replacer. This was a beautifully dense and moist white cake. I would like to modify this recipe to make it a chocolate cake, but was wondering if simply adding cocoa powder would suffice? Thoughts? Thank you for publishing such an incredible recipe that ANYONE can make! 🙂

    1. Wow, Katie…thank you so much! Your comment totally just made my day. 🙂 I’ve never made this cake with egg replacer, so I’m glad it turned out awesome. It is a dense cake, but I wanted it to be like a strawberry shortcake…just in cake form. So as far as turning the cake into chocolate, I’m thinking you could add about 1/2 to 3/4 cup of cocoa powder. But the trick here will be that you’ll need extra milk (or water) to offset that cocoa powder. I don’t know without playing around exactly how much additional liquid…but I’m thinking start with 1/2 cup and then keep adding more until the batter is the same consistency as the vanilla version. I’m sorry I don’t have a super easy answer for you here…but I think it can totally be done! In fact, if you do make a chocolate version, will you let me know? I might just have to post it then! 🙂

      1. Ok, so I made the recipe twice now since the first batch didn’t turn out quite the way I had hoped. The first batch I added 1/4 cup of cocoa powder with 1/2 cup of melted chocolate chips. It was dense, but a tad bit dry and not quite rich enough of a chocolate flavor for me. Tonight I ditched the cocoa powder and went with 1 1/2 cups of melted chocolate chips (60% dark chocolate) and it was fantastic! For anyone wishing to make this egg-free I recommend Ener-g Egg Replacer with 1 tablespoon powder to 2 tablespoons warm water and whisk well. This never fails me in baked goods. Thank you for providing an amazing base recipe!

        1. Ah, good to know! Thank you so much, Katie!! I’m guessing the cocoa powder soaked up all the liquid and led to the cake being a bit dry. Either way, it’s good to know that the 1.5 cups of melted chocolate chips is the key. Now I’m totally craving a chocolate cake. I’ll have to give that version a shot here pretty soon. Oh, did you use cake flour for the chocolate version?

        2. Excellent…thanks! I’ll have to keep this chocolate version in my back pocket. Don’t be surprised if it shows up as a new post sometime. Thank you again! 🙂

  50. Well I tried this cake and although it tastes fine it is a heavy/dense cake and I was wanting something a bit lighter. If I used 3 egg whites beat stiff and folded in plus 2 yolks incorporated into the batter would it make a difference in the cake density? I made a Strawberry Butter cream frosting instead, my family loved it!

    1. Hey Carol! I went with a dense cake on purpose for this recipe as I really wanted to replicate a strawberry shortcake type of dessert. However, if you are looking for a lighter cake recipe, then I would reduce the flour to maybe 2 or 2.25 cups. The egg white trick you described above would certainly help, too. In fact, you could entirely remove the egg yolks and go with about 6 egg whites instead. Oh, and changing to all-purpose flour would change the consistency as well. I hope this helps…and I hope you enjoy the new version! 🙂

      1. Thanks David for the reply & advice! I will try the changes next time. I wish I had read the comments first, I would have seen that you made it to be a dense cake on purpose. I want to be clear this cake tastes good it was just not what I was looking for.

        1. No problem at all, Carol! I agree that this cake is dense…but I totally understand if you’re looking for a lighter cake. After all, it’s cake…you really can’t go wrong with a slice of cake, right? 🙂

  51. Hey David,

    Your cake recipe is so good, and the cake looks so amazing and delicious. Thank you for this awesome delicious recipe.

    1. Thank you so much, Sylvia! The layers of cake can absolutely be made and frozen ahead of time. I’d just recommend letting cakes cool and then wrapping them in plastic wrap. If you’re going to freeze them for a long time (weeks or more), then I’d put them in a ziptop freezer bag, too. I hope you enjoy this cake!!

  52. Saw this on Pinterest and it looks yummy! Unfortunately I can’t stand sweetened cream cheese in any way shape or form (nor can I stand any kind of frosting – especially buttercream – and always scrape it off into the sink)… can I make this without the cream cheese? Is there some kind of thickener I can substitute? With local strawberry season just around the corner, I’d love to make this… thanks!

    1. Hey Mouse! Gosh…that’s a tough question. No frosting at all? Hmmm…right off the top of my head I would suggest changing it up and making a pure sweetened whipped cream and using that. The problem will come with frosting the cake with pure whipped cream. The cream cheese helps thicken the frosting. (Truthfully, I don’t think the frosting tastes very cream cheese-y at all, but that’s just me!) I would recommend making the layers and then just adding sliced strawberries in between layers along with sweetened whipped cream. I would also frost the top, but then don’t try to frost the sides of the cake. (I think the sides will be too difficult with just whipped cream.) So it would end up looking like one of those “naked cakes” but those actually look really cool, too…lets you really see the layers. Sorry I don’t have a super easy substitute for the cream cheese here, but I think that idea will still produce a delicious dessert! 🙂

    1. Hey Kat! You can totally still make this cake. I only have 2 pans, but I made a 3-layer (1.5x recipe) version for the pictures above. You can mix the batter as normal, but just bake the first layer. Let it cool and remove it from the pan and then bake the 2nd layer. You don’t want to let the mixed batter sit too long, but it will be ok for the time it takes to bake a layer. I hope this helps…and I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do! Happy Memorial Day weekend! 🙂

  53. I made just the cake part of this recipe! It tasted amazing, but I wished it had been more spongey and light! When I went to cut a slice, I had to put so much force for the knife to go through!

    1. Hey Ritika! I’m sorry this cake turned out so dense for you. I actually wanted this cake to be a bit denser to pair against the lighter whipped cream frosting (almost a strawberry shortcake type of feel), but you still shouldn’t have needed to put that much force on the knife to cut through it! I hope it still turns out well once you frost it, though. This is absolutely one of our favorite cakes, and I truly hope it works for you!! 🙂

  54. The icing is amazing! However, I found the cake is very dense and tasteless. I made it twice, because I thought I messed up the first time. I recommend a chiffon or angel food cake instead.

    1. Thank you so much, Britt! I’m sorry you found the cake too dense, but I’m really glad you liked the frosting. I personally love the cake, and I think it balances the frosting quite well. But this frosting would totally be awesome on a chiffon or angel food cake, too! Thanks for the idea! 🙂

  55. Hello,
    I’m really looking forward to trying this. I have a question about the vanilla, though — two tablespoons? Didn’t have time to read through all the comments posted so far; perhaps someone’s already mentioned it. I’d guess two teaspoons for the cake and maybe two teaspoons for the frosting. Two tbsp. just seems like a mis-print to me. Best regards, and thank you for posting this wonderful-looking recipe. Mary M.

    1. Hey there, Mary! The vanilla is not a typo, although I do agree with you that it is a lot. I normally would not use 2 Tbsp in a cake, but I wanted to really pump up the flavor of the cake. I personally love the way this cake tastes, and I don’t think the vanilla overpowers the cake at all. However, feel free to reduce the vanilla when you bake your version. You can’t really go wrong with way. I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do…it’s a summer classic around our house! 🙂

      1. Thanks for the feedback, David. As for the denseness of this cake, are we talking, like, pound cake denseness? Looking over the ingredients, I’m guessing it would be closer to a pound cake than to a regular layer cake.

          1. And thank YOU for reading and supporting my blog, Mary! Without awesome people like you, I wouldn’t be able to do this crazy job that we call food blogging. 🙂

        1. Hey Mary! So I would describe this cake as something between a pound cake and a regular layer cake. It’s not quite as dense as a pound cake, but it is definitely denser than a layer cake. I personally love the texture as it plays well with the lighter frosting. I actually have another cake very similar to this one (but with a blackberry twist!) coming up this Friday. I made some slight tweaks to that cake based on reader’s comments here, and I think it might be better than the original. If you are a blackberry fan, then stay tuned for a couple of days. (But to be clear, I think both versions of this cake–this one and the blackberry one–are really quite awesome.) I hope you enjoy it/them! 🙂

          1. I am sure we will. I love blackberries, too, and will be looking forward to seeing your new recipe on Friday. Thanks for being an attentive blogger and of course, fellow lover of cake.

    1. Hey Liz! Thank you so much for coming back and letting me know…I am so glad the cake turned out well and your family enjoyed it! It’s definitely the perfect cake for summer picnics! 🙂 I really appreciate your comment.

  56. Thanks David for my new favorite cake recipe!!! It’s not only my fav but also everyone else that ate it. I made my own birthday cake and picked this one because strawberries are my fav food. I did take a shortcut and used a box cake mix but OMG the frosting was amazing. Once everyone tried some confessions started pouring out as how no one likes the ready made icing and that how amazing this light airy tasty icing is the best. From now on when making a cake this will be the frosting recipe and I will just change it up with different fruits. Thanks for making my 59th birthday special with yummyness. Btw I will need to make another cake now since not everyone got a slice since we just had to have another serving They shouldn’t have been late!! Fortunately I have enough frosting left over for another cake. And I’m making another one of these cakes to take to a friend. I’m sure I will be getting many requests for making more. I have to try your cake recipe now.

    1. Hey Lisa! Thank you SO much for leaving this note. I agree that this frosting is tasty…it’s one of my favorites for summer cakes for sure. (Check out that blackberry cake that I linked up above…it’s incredible, too!) I’m so glad your 59th birthday arrived with a yummy cake to celebrate! 🙂 And now it looks like you’ll be making a lot of cakes this summer with all of the requests from friends. Hey, it could be worse, right? Nothing like celebrating summer with delicious cake and frosting! Cheers, and happy belated birthday!!

  57. I’ve had this recipe pinned for over a year now, and just now got around to making it, and boy I gotta say it’s amazing David! The frosting itself I can just gobble it up! My husband said it reminds him of strawberry shortcake so that’s good right? I’ll definitely be making this cake for my daughters first birthday! Thanks for sharing the recipe.

    1. Wow, thank you so much for coming and letting me know, Ivonne! I’m just like you…I have a Pinterest board full of recipes I want to try, and some of them have been hanging out there for a long time now. I’m glad you made this cake, and I’m really glad that you and your family loved it. It’s definitely one of our favorites around here. I hope you guys have an awesome weekend…thank you so much for stopping by my site! 🙂

    1. Hey Judy! If you look in the notes section at the bottom of the recipe, you’ll see that I made a 1.5x recipe for these photos. I hope this helps! 🙂

  58. I made this cake last night for my daughter’s 1st birthday party. I took a chance on the yummy-looking pictures and hoped it would turn out to be as good as it looked. It did not disappoint. I did 1.5 times the recipe, so I had enough for a double layer cake and a smash cake for my baby. She had never eaten much sugar up this point. She absolutely loved it! She definitely stuffed her face with the strawberries and cream. It made for some fun pictures. We had 20+ friends and relatives over and they also couldn’t stop saying how moist and delicious it was. It was worth the time and effort. A box mix wouldn’t have been nearly as tasty and it is nice to know what ingredients are in my food. Thanks for the recipe! I will make it again!

    1. Hey Charlotte! Thank you so much for coming back and reporting in…and I am so happy that this cake turned out so well for your daughter’s party! What an honor to use this recipe for her first birthday! You are totally right…this cake takes more time than a boxed mix, but it sure beats the heck out of a box mix, too! (And it’s made from scratch.) I’m not gonna lie…hearing about the smash cake just makes me want to bake a cake so I can shove my face in it. Maybe tomorrow! Haha! Thanks again, and I really appreciate you coming back to let me know how it turned out. 🙂

  59. I am looking forward to making this cake for my boyfriend on tuesday! I was wondering if you had the recipe already converted to the three layer cake recipe by any chance?

    1. Hey Drucilla! I don’t have the 3-layer cake amounts converted, but all you need to do is just multiply each ingredient in the cake by 1.5x. I did it when I made the version you see in this post, but I didn’t write the new amounts down since I usually make this cake as a 2-layer cake. I hope this helps, and I hope you like this cake as much as we do!!

  60. Thank you very much for your advice, since the first time I wrote as long but you are quite right, I now use the cake flour and sour cream just as you advise, and I also use oil and really does make a big difference, cakes and are much better, more moist and soft, thank you very much!!

    1. Thanks so much, Alice! I’m glad the oil and sour cream tricks are working for you. Baking is all about experimenting until you find the right combination. Thanks so much for coming back and letting me know…and happy baking!!

  61. I baked this cake for my Grandmothers 80th tonight…I followed the frosting directions to a T (even taking heed of some of the bakers notes) but unfortunately it came out somewhat soupy… I told my Mom about it and she said she hadn’t heard of using granulated sugar in a frosting… I might try powered sugar for the frosting if I make this cake again. I ended up going out to get some already made frosting, which is kind of a bummer. I was able to use the original “frosting” in the middle of the cake so hopefully it’s still good!

    1. Hey Caralyn! I’m sorry to hear that your frosting turned out soupy. I would guess that perhaps the cream wasn’t whipped enough…I only say that because I’ve been there, done that! 🙂 But yes, give the powdered sugar a shot next time. I’m sure the original frosting will still be delicious inside the cake, too. I hope you enjoy the cake, and I hope your grandmother has an awesome 80th birthday tonight!!

  62. Thanks for this beautiful recipe! I made it last night to eat today. I absolutely loved the actual cake – nice and dense but not too much and a wonderful flavour. The icing was so yummy! I made mine last night and iced it this morning – it did get a bit runnier but I was still able to ice the cake with it and it tasted great. I would love it if the icing kept the texture of whipped cream – is it possible to achieve that? I think I could have whipped my cream a little longer, but even last night I found that once I mixed the cream in with the cream cheese/strawberry mixture it lost a lot of the fluffy texture.

    1. Hey Krista! Thank you so much for the kind words. The icing is certainly a challenge with this cake, and I completely understand where you are coming from here. I did have a couple of readers suggest using powdered sugar in the icing, but I haven’t personally done that myself yet. It seems like it should work well, although it could change the texture of the icing a bit.

      With that said, I did make a similar version of this cake using blackberries instead of strawberries. (http://spicedblog.com/blackberry-cake.html) I used powdered sugar for that frosting, and I changed the heavy cream-cream cheese proportions a bit. It worked beautifully! That frosting used blackberries in the actual frosting, though, but I’m thinking you could use that version as a base (omit blackberries) and then add fresh strawberries once it was done so it would be more like this recipe. Does that make sense? I hope it helps, and I do really appreciate you leaving a comment. Thanks again, and have a great weekend!

    1. Hey Ivonne! Hmmm…good question. I’ve never made this cake in cupcake form, but I think it can be done. You will obviously want to bake the cupcakes for less time than the actual cake. (I’d start around ~15 minutes and just check on them occasionally.) The problem will come from the frosting since cupcakes require a stiffer frosting. As you may notice from other comments, this is a very loose frosting. It works on the cake (as you can see in the photos), but I don’t think it would stand up on a cupcake very well. You might consider switching to powdered sugar in the frosting and then adding more (~1/2 cup at a time) until it gets stiff enough to stand up for cupcakes. Does this make sense? I hope this works…if you do give them a shot in cupcake form, then will you let me know how they turned out? I might just have to experiment with the cupcake version myself if it works out well! 🙂

  63. Do you have any high altitude adjustments for this recipe? Baking can be tricky here in Colorado :/ I really want to make this for my sons birthday but I really only have one shot seeing as how it’s tomorrow I don’t wanna mess it up

    1. Unfortunately, I’ve never baked a lot at high altitudes myself, so I don’t have a lot of personal experiences to suggest. However, this is a great link (http://bit.ly/1cLgBTe) that has good tips on high altitude baking. My personal recommendation is to make sure to really whip that frosting or perhaps use powdered sugar in the frosting like other readers have suggested. Other than that, just have fun baking!!

  64. I wanted to tell you how amazing this cake is. I made it a couple of weeks ago for a celebration for myself. I love baking and haven’t ever baked anything just for myself, I searched and stumbled on your recipe, read it over and over, also read all the comments and your replies.. Simply the best cake I’ve ever made or had. I made the double layer version, I myself and my kids all loved the extra frosting this makes. I think it would be a delicious fruit dip. Thank you for helping me make my celebration even more perfect with the this cake.

    1. Hey Millie! Thank you so much for your kind comments! This cake is absolutely one of my favorite ones to make, and I’m really glad you (and the kids) enjoyed it. That’s a serious honor to call it the best cake you’ve ever made. 🙂 Thank you again, and don’t be a stranger! Happy baking!

  65. I made this cake for my son’s birthday party yesterday and was a little disappointed at how the frosting turned out. I followed your instructions and whipped the cream to very stiff peaks and kept it refrigerated while I whipped the rest of the ingredients. I wonder if the strawberries released too much liquid because while it was fluffy, it was nowhere near stiff enough to use as a frosting, so I decided to take a different approach…

    I sliced the cakes into small wedges and served them with a “plop” of the strawberry whip. We jokingly called it “Strawberry Plop.” It was a big hit, actually! So, while I was bummed I couldn’t serve a traditional frosted cake, all turned out tasty in the end 🙂

    1. Hey Amanda! I’m so sorry the frosting didn’t turn out. As other readers have pointed out, it is indeed a bit tricky. However, I’m glad you were able to salvage the cake as Strawberry Plop instead. That sounds pretty darned delicious to me! I did play around with this frosting and created an updated version for the Blackberry Cake that I linked above (at the end of the post). If you’re in the baking mood, give that a shot. Of course, if you want to keep the sliced strawberries, you’ll just have to omit the blackberry puree. (Or perhaps make a strawberry puree and go with a pink cake instead?) Thanks so much for commenting…I do appreciate each and every comment! 🙂 Happy baking!

  66. I made this cake for my son’s birthday. The frosting turned out very runny. I puréed the strawberries in the blender, the result was liquid. I think that’s what made the whole thing runny.

    1. Hey there, Ginger! I’m sorry the frosting turned out runny for you, but I do agree. I think pureeing the strawberries rather than chopping them is the culprit here. However, I bet if you cook that puree down a bit (like in the blackberry version that I linked in the post), then it would probably work out quite well. The frosting would be pink instead of white, but the consistency should be perfect. I do hope you give this frosting a shot again! 🙂

  67. I made this cake for Valentine’s Day – my family loved it. But the frosting was so runny I had to break up the cake and layer it in a pretty glass bowl instead.
    It’s possible I didn’t whip my heavy cream long enough. My question is – was I supposed to hand mix in the strawberry pieces into the sugar/cream cheese? I mixed them a little bit with the mixer, before folding in the whipped cream – was that wrong?

    1. Hey there, Hoy! A number of other readers have commented that their frosting was very loose, too. I’ve tried this frosting a couple of times myself, and it is indeed loose…but I’ve still been able to frost the cake with it. I do really whip the heck out of the cream, though, so I suspect that might be the difference. Of course, you could try increasing the cream cheese to whipped cream ratio–that would certainly make it a stiffer frosting. I also tried a different method for this frosting in the Blackberry Cake that I linked above (I made the Blackberry Cake a year after I first posted this strawberry version…), and the blackberry frosting worked great! From what it sounds like, you mixed the frosting correctly, but I wonder if maybe you could have just whipped the cream a bit more. Either way, I’m glad your family enjoyed it, and I’m sorry you had to turn it into a trifle-style dessert instead. I do hope you’ll give it a shot again sometime and try one of the tips I mentioned above. Thanks for leaving a comment! 🙂

  68. Hi! Your cake is absolutely gorgeous. It would top any chocolate cake for me (fruit lover here!). I was just wondering, compared to your updated blackberry cake recipe, is there any reason why you changed some of the ingredient proportions for the cake recipe (baking powder, eggs, milk, etc.). I want to make it but I just don’t know which cake recipe to choose. I have found the reasons for the frosting changes 🙂 Thanks for any help!

    1. Hey there, Lauren! First of all, thanks so much for the very kind complement. So this cake here in the Strawberry version is my go-to yellow cake while the Blackberry one is my go-to white cake. Both cakes are quite tasty, but truthfully I think I like the white cake better. When I made that white cake for the first time, I remember my wife telling me that I shouldn’t ever change that recipe again. So in the end, you can definitely go either way…but I’d probably recommend the white cake from the Blackberry cake post. And thanks for understanding the frosting changes, too. That one is just so hard to describe in words! I do hope you enjoy the cake…whichever version you choose! And please don’t hesitate to ask if you have other questions. I’m happy to try and help. Happy Leap Day! 🙂

  69. I’ve also made your recipe with fresh red raspberries. It received rave reviews.i took it to a Dessert Auction at church and it raised $400.00 for a summer missions trip for our teens!

    1. Wow! That is awesome, Jo! First of all, great idea on using raspberries. Second, I’m so happy that the cake raised $400 for mission trips. I did a lot of mission work through my church when I was in high school, and I know how important that money is. Thank you for coming back and leaving a comment here…I really do appreciate it! 🙂

  70. Yum!! Made this lovely cake for my daughter’s 5th birthday today. I followed the “whip it…whip it good” suggestion and the frosting turned out perfectly!! The cake was also delicious. However, I only had AP flour on hand, so that may have changed the outcome a little. My cake was dense – more like shortbread. Very delicious, just very hard to cut into. I’m planning on making this again next week, so I’ll give it a go with cake flour. Either way, it was really delicious! Thank you for a great recipe!!

    1. Haha! I should’ve called this cake “Devo Cake”! Whip it…whip it good! I’m so glad this cake turned out so well for you, Madeline. I’ve struggled with how else to say whip that frosting until it’s way stiffer than normal…but there’s only one way to say it! So this is indeed more of a shortbread style of cake. The cake is dense, and I don’t think cake flour would make it less dense. I kinda like it as it is a twist on a strawberry shortcake. However, if you’re looking for a different style of cake, I suggest checking out the yellow cake that I used in the Blackberry Cake recipe (linked in post above). I honestly think you can’t go wrong with whatever style of cake you use…it is cake after all! Thank you so much for your kind comment, and I’m really happy that you enjoyed this recipe. Have a great weekend! 🙂

      1. Ah, I was just enjoying another slice of Devo cake…and it is still delicious. Even more delicious as the strawberry flavor seems to have intensified. I’m a happy girl right now!
        I’ll give the yellow cake recipe a try, too, as I’m sure that’s awesome, too. Thanks so much!

        1. I agree with you, Madeline! The cake does develop a stronger strawberry flavor overnight. Now you’ve convinced me that it’s about time to make another one of these cakes for us…strawberry season is sorta close, right? 🙂 Thanks again!!

  71. I followed recipe for the frosting to s T. Didn’t work for me. I put the runny frosting between the layers and it started sliding over. Almost had a disaster. I ended up making a strawberry buttercream and added a few spoonfuls of the strawberry/cream cheese /whipped crm mixture to it. Even that was almost too soft but ended up setting ok-ish in the fridge.

    1. Hey Jill, I’m sorry to hear the frosting recipe didn’t work out. If you make it again, you’ve really got to whip that cream well past ‘normal’ whipped cream. It will look overwhipped for sure, but once those other ingredients get added it will loosen up…as I’m sure you realize now. (The other alternative is to make a frosting similar to the Blackberry Cake as that one has less cream and more cream cheese to make it a bit thicker.) Either way, I hope the taste of the cake is great! 🙂

  72. I made the cake part of this recipe and the texture is amazing! It’s just what I’ve been searching for and let me tell you. . . I’ve been searching for a white/vanilla cake recipe for years and each attempt has ended in disappointment. My heart is happy right now. Thank you for sharing this recipe!

    1. Hey Kelly! Your comment totally just made my afternoon. Thank you! 🙂 This is my go-to white cake whenever I need one…which more often than not is for this Strawberry Cake. Enjoy…and happy baking!

  73. This is a silly question, but I’m not really a cake person…you may have changed that with this recipe! Can I make this in a 9 x13 dish and would I bake for approx the same amount of time? I would assume I would need less frosting too? Thanks, love your sister’s and your site!!

    1. Hey Thea! Thank you so much for stopping over and commenting. 🙂 You really are too kind! So I’ve never baked this cake in a 9×13 dish, so I can’t comment for 100% certainly on the baking time. However, the volume of batter/cake is pretty similar, so I’m going to guess that the baking time will be close to the same. I would just start with ~25-28 minutes, and then check it by sticking a toothpick into the center of the cake. If it comes out clean, then you’re all set. If not, stick it back in the oven and try again in a couple of minutes. The biggest thing to remember about this cake is to really whip that whipped cream well when you start…otherwise the frosting will be WAY too loose. You could also add more cream cheese to the frosting to help ‘stabilize’ it and make it a bit thicker. Either way works. I really hope this cake turns you into a cake person! Feel free to ask if you have any questions at all! 🙂

  74. Made the cake exactly as recipe reads. did adjust the frosting following directions for adding 4 oz more or cream cheese. totally enough to frost 2 more cakes and its pretty wet cake. darn..had hoped it would look like yours.

    1. That is a good point, Maureen. I didn’t think about that, but this frosting recipe already makes a lot…so if you add more cream cheese to thicken it a bit, then you just end up with even more frosting. (But, hey, extra frosting is never a bad thing, right?) I’m sorry to hear the frosting was still wet though. It seems like about half of the readers have this problem. Perhaps next time add a bit of powdered sugar to help soak up some of the liquid. And make sure to really whip that whipped cream until it’s super thick (pretty much overwhipped…) Either way, I hope you still enjoyed the taste of this cake. It’s one of our favorite summer desserts around our house! 🙂

  75. I made this cake today for my niece’s birthday at her request. I followed the instructions as written and was trying very hard not to screw this up. I whipped the cream until it was very stiff as directed. The frosting was loose but it didn’t slide off of the cake as I thought it would. I did put the frosting in the fridge for 45 mins hoping it would set a little more. Since there was so much frosting I decided I would be very generous between the layers, the top and the sides. A lot of the frosting ended up on the table and there was plenty left over. Dense cakes are not my preference but this one turned out ok. I would have wanted it to be a little sweeter also. If I decide to make it again, I will try plain flour and 1/2 cup more sugar. I am happy that I agreed to make the cake.

    1. Great! I’m so glad this cake turned out well for you Darlene. I agree that the frosting recipe does make a lot…and perhaps I should reduce the amounts in the recipe. (Of course, I don’t ever mind having extra frosting to eat just with sliced berries.) And yes, this is a dense poundcake type of cake. I personally like how it partners with the light frosting, but I also do appreciate a good “lighter” white cake. I do hope you make this cake again sometime, and I do hope you guys enjoyed this one over the weekend. Thanks so much for stopping by to comment! 🙂

  76. Hi! Oh my gosh! I have family visiting from Switzerland and I wanted to make something really special for dessert- so I made this cake. It turned out beautiful and perfect! I did reduce the whipped cream to 2 cups and it worked great!! I can’t wait to try it tonight! I can’t even bake but I took my time and went slow and it was perfect. Took me 2.5 hours total to make. Thank you!

    1. Hey Jackie! Wow, thank you so much for such a nice comment. Reading this totally made my day! This is an involved cake to make, but it sounds like it turned out quite well for you. I really hope you enjoyed eating it last night…and I hope your family enjoyed it, too! What a way to welcome them to town! 🙂 And good call on the 2 cups of cream…I’ll have to remember that next time I make this cake…which is probably sometime soon. Thanks again for your comment, and have a great weekend!!

  77. Hello,

    Both of the cakes look delicious, and I can’t wait to make one (or both). How far in advance of serving can the cake be made? I’m guessing it should be refrigerated because of the dairy products in the frosting. And are the strawberry slices to be put on the frosting just before serving? I’m wondering if they would go juicy and make the frosting a bit wet if they’re on for too long beforehand. Thank you!

    1. Hey Brian! Thanks so much for stopping by, and thank you even more for leaving a comment. You can certainly make the cakes ahead of time. In fact, you could make the cakes, let them cool, wrap them in plastic wrap and then freeze them for a couple of weeks. Just let them thaw unwrapped at room temperature. As far as the frosting, that one unfortunately should be made day-of. But with the cakes baked already, it drastically cuts down on the time on the day of the event!

      You are absolutely correct on the strawberries, too. They would start to release juices thanks to the sugar in the frosting…which is another reason to make that frosting day-of.

      If you’ve read some of the other comments, you’ll notice that it seems like about half of the folks who make this cake have trouble with the frosting being too loose. I’ve added some tips to the post, but I’m still hearing back that the frosting was like whipped cream in texture. I’ve never had this happen, and a number of readers have reported (and sent photos) that the frosting worked for them. With all of this said, I’m planning on experimenting over the weekend with a more traditional cream cheese style frosting using powdered sugar. It’ll still need to be made day-of to the juicy strawberries, but hopefully it will solve the looseness problem. Stay tuned…I’ll post that 2nd frosting recipe here once I’m happy with it. 🙂 Oh, and I hope you enjoy this cake…that goes without saying!

      1. Hi David,

        Thank you for your response, with so much useful information. That’s a good idea about making the cake layers ahead, and then assembling it on the day it’s to be served. I had some concern about the bit about whipping the cream past the stiff peak stage, as I was wondering if it would separate into butter and whey, but I will try it and see how it goes.

        I’ve just seen your upside-down peach cake recipe and it looks delicious, too. I’m hoping I will find a no-bake dessert on your site, as I’m going to a BBQ this weekend, and even with AC, I don’t like to use the oven in the summer. Thanks again!

        1. My pleasure, Brian! The whipped cream shouldn’t be whipped until it separates, but it should go well past the point of ‘normal’ whipped cream. I think that’s where the problem lies…it’s hard to describe that stage of whipped cream! Thus the plan to update the recipe with a 2nd option for the frosting. 🙂

          Thank you so much for your compliments! As far as No-Bake, I highly recommend this No Bake Peanut Butter Pie (http://spicedblog.com/no-bake-peanut-butter-pie.html). For something a bit lighter in flavor, this Atlantic Beach Pie is phenomenal…although it does require baking. But did I mention that it’s phenomenal! 🙂 (http://spicedblog.com/atlantic-beach-pie.html) Thanks again!

          1. Thank you, David. I will save the strawberry cake for another time, when the weather is not as hot. But I think for this coming weekend, I’ll make your Raspberry-lemon Mascarpone Tart. As I don’t want to use the oven, I’ll make a crumb crust instead, probably using vanilla wafers, or maybe graham wafers. I’m sure everybody will love it. Thanks again.

        2. Oh, I forgot about that raspberry mascarpone tart! That’s one of Laura’s (my wife) favorites! Have a great time at the party this weekend, and enjoy that tart. 🙂 Also, thank you so much for your comments/visiting Spiced. Without awesome readers like you, I wouldn’t be able to keep this site going!

  78. This is such an amazing cake! My husband hates cake because it’s too sweet, but he loves this one! My youngest daughter can’t have store bought cakes, because she is allergic to red 40 dye. So for the past year and a half, I make this cake for every birthday/holiday! I almost always make it with strawberries, but I did make it with blueberries once and it was just as fabulous! Thank you so much for sharing this recipe! Now I’m off to make another one for my baby girls 4th birthday!

    1. Hey Jennifer! Thank you so much for taking the time to leave this comment. It really did make my day yesterday when I read it! And I love that this cake has become your go-to cake for birthdays and holidays. It really is a good one! Some readers are having trouble with the frosting, so I think I might update this post with a 2nd option for the frosting. (I still love the original myself, but I’m thinking 2 options can’t hurt, right?) Thanks again for being awesome, and I hope your daughter has an amazing 4th birthday!!

      1. Hi David!

        Thank you, she had a great birthday! I have made this cake a lot and I’ve never had an issue, but I do wonder a few things. I wonder if those whose frosting is turning out too thin, are over mixing the two mixtures causing the whipped cream to fall flat. I also wonder if they are actually mixing instead of folding the two together. When I make this I use a rubber spatula and fold the whipped cream into the strawberry/cream cheese mixture.

        Anyways, I’m not sure if this helps, but it was just something I was thinking. You’re right, 2 options can’t hurt!

        1. Hey there, Jennifer! You know what, you might be onto something with the whipping of the cream. I had a hard time describing it in words in the post, so I kept saying just to whip the cream well past the standard whipped cream phase…but you’re right! If folks are overwhipping the cream, then it could cause trouble. I might try to update the description of the stages to clarify. This is the only post where I have had trouble describing the recipe in words!

          And yes, 2 frostings are still better than 1! 🙂 Thank you!!

  79. I just finished making this cake, it is absolutely perfect. I am a beginner baker, and I found this recipe very simple and I had most of the ingredients on hand! It is my husband’s birthday today and I am so excited to surprise him with this beautiful cake when he gets home… So out of character for me hehe.

    1. Hey Bethany! Thank you so much for your comment. I really try to make my recipes easy to understand…even if the recipe is a bit more involved (like this Strawberry Cake). I’m so glad it turned out well for you…your comment made my night last night when I saw it. I hope your husband was surprised and enjoyed the cake. (Also, my wife’s birthday was yesterday, too…small world!) Thanks again! 🙂

  80. Hi. I want to make this got my daughter’s first birthday so I love that the frosting turns pink! If I want a smoother look without the diced strawberries showing on the outside, what do you suggest I do? I was thinking of smashing the strawberries for the frosting but worried it will change the consistency and/or make the frosting too tart.

    Any suggestions would be much appreciated!

    1. Hey there, Yassi! Thank you so much for stopping by…I think this cake would make an excellent choice for your daughter’s first birthday. 🙂 To get that pink color in the frosting, I would indeed recommend smashing or even pureeing the strawberries in a mini chopper. In fact, I would probably do something similar to this Blackberry Cake: http://spicedblog.com/blackberry-cake.html. However, I would recommend using the cream cheese frosting version above, though, as I’m afraid the extra moisture from the smashed/pureed strawberries wouldn’t work with the whipped cream frosting. I hope this makes sense! Come back and let me know how it turns out! Oh, and tell your daughter happy 1st birthday…our son turns 1 on November 19! 🙂

      1. Thank you so very much! I’m so glad I discovered your blog. This is my favorite kind of cake and it is exactly what I was looking for. Can’t wait to make it. Happy birthday your little boy too!

  81. Hey there! First of all, this cake looks SO GOOD! Now, I’m not sure if you’re still answering questions on this post, but if so, I have a question! I am planning on making this cake for my daughter’s birthday this coming weekend and I was curios if the frosting is able to be piped? Or is it too light of a frosting for that? I’m planning to make some basic roses on her cake. Thanks in advance!

    1. Hey there, Arianna! Thank you so much for your kind comment. This cake tastes as good as it looks…if not better!

      I am indeed still responding to comments on this post (obviously…haha). So I don’t think this frosting will be stiff enough to pipe roses. You could try adding a lot more powdered sugar to stiffen it up, but I’m not sure how that would work out. Personally, I would recommend going with the cream cheese frosting listed above and then just buying a bit of store-bought icing for the roses. (You could also just make a tiny amount of buttercream for the roses…but since you don’t need much at all, I say just buy it.) You could either grab a can in the aisle, or just check with the bakery…a lot of bakeries will sell little containers of their frosting. That way you’d have the cake as it is, but then you could still pipe roses for the top. 🙂

      Also, this comment makes me want to go pipe roses…I haven’t done that in a couple of years now, and I wonder if I still could. Hah! Either way, I do hope you enjoy it, and I hope your daughter has an amazing birthday! Our son’s 1st birthday is coming up in just 2 days now.

      1. Awesome thank you so much for replying! I found that using half the heavy cream (just for the outside of the cake) makes the frosting easy to pipe!
        I hope your son has a wonderful first birthday! 🙂

        1. Ooo…good tip about half the heavy cream and piping! I had no idea that would work! 🙂 And thank you for the happy birthday wishes. I’m off to spend the day cleaning up before the in-laws arrive…haha.

  82. I am unsure wheather to make the cream cheese frosting or the original one? Do they taste differently? What’s the difference between them? Also you put sliced strawberries into the frosting as well as on top of the cake or just on top of the cake? Thank you for the recipe! 🙂

    1. Hey Jocelyn! Well, I’m not sure which frosting to recommend. I personally love the whipped cream version in the summer because it’s nice and light, and I go for the cream cheese frosting in colder months. Also, the cream cheese frosting is way easier to make, so that’s a bonus! And I do fold some sliced strawberries into the frosting. If you go with the cream cheese frosting here, I’d recommend just putting a layer of sliced strawberries into the middle of each layer of cake when you frost it. That would definitely give you a very pretty cake…and delicious, too! Hope you enjoy this one as much as we do…and happy (early) Thanksgiving (if you live in the States)! 🙂

  83. Hi there! Wondering about making this recipe into cupcakes… Any suggestions?
    Thank you!
    Georgia

    1. Hey there, Georgia! Good idea on turning these into cupcakes…they’d be perfect for a spring-time party! 🙂 I’ve never tried baking this cake in cupcake form, but I’d venture to guess that the standard rules apply here: (1) Bake the cupcakes for ~1/2 the time as the cake. I’d start with 15-16 minutes, and then start peeking at the cupcakes. Just use a toothpick to see when they are completely done. (I’d guess it will be about 18-19 minutes, but I’d rather err on the side of putting them back in than overbaking!) (2) A standard 9″ cake yields about 12 cupcakes. That means this recipe would yield about 24 cupcakes (give or take) as the recipe is scaled for 2 9″ cakes. (3) This goes without saying, but make sure to grease the pan or use cupcake wrappers! I wouldn’t recommend putting any strawberries into the cake (this recipe doesn’t do that either) as the berries could stick to the liners/sides of pan and create trouble. (4) Fill the cupcakes ~2/3 full. If you have time, I’d recommend baking one cupcake as a test and then proceeding with the rest. That way you’ll know how full to fill each one! (5) I would only recommend the standard cream cheese frosting here. For cupcakes, you need a stiff frosting, and the whipped cream version is too light. I’d also recommend just adding the strawberries after frosting the cupcakes. Otherwise the berries will make it difficult to pipe or or spread the frosting. I hope I haven’t overloaded you with info! And I really hope these cupcakes turn out awesome! If you get the chance, come back and let me know how they turn out. 🙂 Happy baking!

    1. Hey Hannah! I think pairing this frosting with a chocolate cake is an amazing idea! I personally don’t think either of the two frosting options is too sweet. In fact, I’m loving the idea of chocolate + strawberry! If you give it a try, let me know how it turns out? Maybe I’ll have to do a post on that sometime if it works! 🙂 Thanks, and happy baking!

  84. This is going to be the FIRST cake I have ever made. It is my moms birthday today so I wanted to do something special, what’s more special than baking your first cake ever from scratch? I’m really hoping I do a good job. Every time my mom makes a cake honestly, it doesn’t ever taste like cake as others have posted lol.. so I’m afraid of my cake coming out that way as well. I really hope I’ve found just the right recipe and that I do a great job in the measurements! Even when baking cookies (which I am good at) they always taste different every single time I make them although I go by the same exact ingredients and cook time lol. I’m stoked to try this!

    1. Oh my gosh, I really hope the cake turned out great yesterday, Brittany! Baking your first ever cake from scratch is definitely a good way to say happy birthday to your mom. (I hope she had a great birthday, by the way!) How did this cake turn out? And which frosting did you use? The 2nd one (Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting) is definitely an easier one if you’ve never made frosting before. Either way, I hope this cake was a huge success! Have a great weekend, and happy baking! 🙂

  85. I’m about to make this cake for Easter tomorrow. I want to know if I make the cake a day ahead will it hold until tomorrow since the frosting is so loose? Or should I make the cakes today and the frosting tomorrow? And I’m assuming that leftovers should be stored in the refrigerator- is that correct? I’m just trying to do some of the meal prep ahead of time so I can enjoy the day too! I’m excited for this cake!! Thanks!

    1. Hey there, Karisse! I’m guessing you’re probably well into cake baking by now since that comment was a couple of hours ago. I totally get baking/cooking ahead of time so that Easter isn’t too crazy! Since you’re making this one ahead of time, I highly recommend the 2nd frosting (Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting). The Original frosting is whipped cream based, and it really is better the day of. (If you do make the Original frosting, make sure to really overwhip that frosting. A number of readers have commented that their frosting was too loose…and that happens if you only whip the whipped cream to ‘normal’ consistency.) Also, if you go with the 2nd frosting, then you can make the whole cake today and just keep it in the fridge. (I would save the fresh berries for tomorrow though since they will weep a little bit once they touch the sugar.) I hope I helped a little bit here, and I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do around here. Happy Easter! (Oh, and let me know how the cake turns out! Happy baking!)

      1. Okay, so I made the cakes on Saturday and the frosting on Sunday afternoon before dinner. The cake tasted good but was more dense than expected. The cream cheese frosting gave me a few issues. The buttercream was perfectly fine in the mixer until I added the strawberries. My first mistake was not chopping them small enough- my almost six year was helping with that so no big deal. The problem came when I added them to the frosting. The look of it changed like it broke. It still tasted good and had a good mouth feel, but it looked weird and it was really loose. I put it in the fridge once I frosted the cake and that helped. My husband and guests LOVED it but I was a little disappointed with the look of the frosting. I’m not sure what happened. Maybe the cold strawberries in the room temperature buttercream was the problem…idk but thanks for the recipe!

        1. Hey Karisse! Yes, this cake is a bit more dense than most white cakes. (I actually kinda like it that way…but call me crazy!) So I’m surprised to hear about the frosting. What a bummer! I’m really not sure what happened there either. Were the berries cold? I’ve heard of issues where frostings can break if the ingredients are different temperatures? Separately, I’ve also heard that cream cheese frostings have a tendency to break if they are overwhipped…although to be honest, your’s doesn’t sound overwhipped? I wonder if a bit more powdered sugar mixed in there would have stiffen the frosting up again? Just some thoughts since it’s difficult to troubleshoot without being there! Either way, I’m glad the flavor turned out well! Hopefully you’ll be inclined to try this one again sometime. (And feel free to use a different white cake base if you prefer!) Thanks for keeping me in the loop, and I hope you have a great Monday, my baking friend! 🙂

  86. I’m baking this right now as an Easter treat!

    I don’t have 2 pans and was feeling lazy so I just put the batter in the one round pan I have. On top of that, the batter was insanely thick, so whilst I was initially going to just bake one layer and then bake the other layer after, I had such a tough time splitting the batter and then spreading it evenly so I just gave in and did the one.

    I’m not sure how much longer I’ll need to bake it (since it’ll be thicker), but I’m hoping it’ll come out alright.

    I made a few tweaks based on other comments; I used all purpose flour and didn’t do the whole cornstarch thing. I also added a splash of extra milk to loosen the batter a little, but I didn’t want to add too much in case it altered the texture or anything else. So really it didn’t loosen the batter too much, just made it a little easier to mix (no stand mixer yet 🙁 )

    I’m looking forward to tasting it once I’ve done up the frosting! (Going to do the cream cheese variant)

    1. Hey there, Shannon! I’m so glad you’re making this cake right now. I’m guessing the cake is probably already done…or at least close to it. If you’re baking all of this batter in one pan, it will definitely take longer (but you already knew that!). I might have suggested lowering the oven temperature slightly so that the outer portion of the cake doesn’t burn while the inner portion continues to bake. Did the cake turn out well in a single layer?

      The cornstarch trick isn’t a big deal at all! All-purpose flour will be totally fine for this cake! I really hope this cake tastes great for you…it’s one of our favorites around here! 🙂 Thanks so much for leaving this comment!

      1. Yes, it’s out and cooling now!

        The top did brown a bit (It rose quite a bit too, so in the end, no big deal since i’ll just trim the top). I let it go for about 15 more minutes, and when i stuck a toothpick in, it seemed the tiniest bit wet, so i let it cool in the oven for another 10.

        Once i turned it out onto a rack, it seemed perfect! (though I did have a mishap turning it out, as it uh.. slipped and fell onto the stove. But it’s still in one piece, so all is good).

        It definitely won’t be as pretty as yours, but edible nonetheless. Plus I’ve already had spoonfuls of the frosting, which is delicious, though i think I could’ve done with an extra container of strawberries.

        I’m dying for it to cool down so I can frost it and EAT it!

        I think so far, if I were to do this again, I’d definitely do the two separate pans. Mine won’t be as tall, especially since I’m going to be trimming a good hunk off the top. But hey, as long as it tastes good, who really cares 🙂 I know the hubby won’t, haha.

        1. Update on cake:
          Didn’t turn out great. Husband said the texture was like cornbread, and the cake was more a ‘sweet cornbread with frosting’. Which was super disappointing.

          It wasn’t bad, it tasted good, but it was sad.

        2. Oh no! I’m so sorry to hear that the cake wasn’t a success, Shannon. This is a denser cake…a bit like a pound cake…in texture, but I don’t think I’ve ever had it turn out like cornbread. Based on what you mentioned earlier, I wonder if this had something to do with the mixing. This batter is thick (not pourable), but using a mixer to cream the butter + sugar makes for a really light base because it adds so much air in there. I know you don’t have a countertop mixer, but a handheld mixer can do the same job and it’s a lot more affordable! Just a thought there. And the cake flour vs. all-purpose flour is a though if you happen to try this cake again…although that alone wouldn’t lead to a ‘cornmeal-y’ type of texture.

          Oh, and I would try baking this one in two pans next time, too! But hey, at the end of the day, baking is all about learning, right? I’m glad you gave this cake a shot, and if you try again, then I definitely hope it turns out better! Make sure to really whip that butter and sugar to create a light, airy base first! 🙂 Either way, thank you for the updates, and I hope you have a great week ahead, my friend!

  87. Can I use unbleached pastry flour instead of cake flour? Im having such a hard time finding vake flour. Thanks.

    1. Hey there, Arpi! Sorry to hear about the trouble finding cake flour. It is a unique one for sure. I’m not sure where you live, but I have seen cake flour in large supermarkets under the name ‘Softasilk’…I think Pillsbury makes it? Bobs Red Mill also makes it, and they have a handy product finder on their website…you might check it out to see if any stores in your area carry it.

      Either way, I would not recommend using pastry flour instead. Pastry flour is best for things like biscuits, scones or pie crusts…but I wouldn’t recommend it for cake. Instead, I would just go with all-purpose flour. Or if you really want to, then a quick “cheat” to make cake flour at home is to take 1 cup of all purpose flour, remove 2 Tbsp of flour and then replace it with 2 Tbsp of cornstarch. Mix well and then make the cake as normal. But in a pinch, 100% all purpose would be my recommendation! I hope this helps, and I hope you like this cake as much as we do in our house! 🙂

      1. Boy do I wish I read your response before I made the cake! Opsiee my fault. Unfortunately I ended up using the pastry flour i mentioned after doing a ton of research and the perfectage of protein wasn’t so far off from cake flour. I took the risk and made 4 layers of the cake on purpose so I can try one before deciding to put the 3 layers together. They came out beautiful but the verdict will be on the taste. I live in CA and finding cake flour was hard for some reason.. I checked 5 stores! Im praying I didnt mess this up 😕 Ill keep you posted. Thanks for the reaponse!

        1. Oh my goodness! 5 stores?? Do try checking out that Bob’s Red Mill product finder for the future. But as I mentioned before, all-purpose is a totally fine substitute here. Good call on making the 4 layers so you can taste-test it. This is a denser white cake in general, but I like it when paired with the frosting…it just works in my opinion! 🙂 I do hope the taste test passes! And please do let me know what you think. I’ve got my fingers crossed for you, my baking friend!

  88. Looks awesome! I’m thinking of making this for my mother-in-law who loves strawberries 🙂 But since I only have one cake pan, and would prefer to not bake in two cycles, will it be ok if I pour it all into one pan and then cut the finished cake in layers?
    How much do you think the baking time will change (I am assuming I have to increase time)? Should I also increase baking powder? Or will doing it like that change the texture too much? Thanks in advance!

    1. Hey Marubi! Thank you so much for the kind words. 🙂 So I wouldn’t recommend just pouring all of the batter into one pan. (The recipe itself is for a 2-layer cake.) The baking time would definitely change, and you’d want to bake it at a lower temperature…but the problem is I have no idea how much the time and temperature would change. I know it’s a bit of a pain to bake the cake in 2 rounds, but I highly recommend going that direction if you can. Oh, and if you do try the “all in one pan” method, don’t add more baking powder. The only things that would change are time and temperature…but like I mentioned, I have no idea how much to suggest! I do hope you make this cake, and I do hope you enjoy it as much as we do around our house! Thank you!

      1. Thank you for the fast answer! I will try to plan the baking when I have enough time to make it in two rounds 🙂 Will get back with the results!

          1. So yesterday (a day before I planned the baking) I was walking through our town and happened upon a sale of baking pans. Score! 😀
            Figured go big or go home, so I ended up making three layers, baked separately. And I’m glad I did, the cake turned out fantastic! 🙂
            I did use my own trusty frosting though, as neither me nor others in the family like whipped cream based or buttercream frostings that much. I do 2 parts quark and 1 part whipped cream as a base, then the strawberries&sugar as per your recipe.
            “Had to” trim the tops a bit, to taste test before I serve it this evening. Delicious! Thank you for the recipe and advice! 🙂

        1. So I think the sale on baking pans was the universe telling you to make this cake, Marubi! 🙂 Talk about perfect timing!! I saw your comment over the long weekend here, and it absolutely made me smile. Thank you so much! I’m really happy that the cake turned out well. I’ve never made anything with quark (it’s not that common in our area), but I’ll have to keep my eye open for it. Thanks again for the comment, and I hope you enjoyed every single slice of this fun cake!!

  89. I make layer cakes all the time and have never had such a horrendous time with a cake. I had to make the actual cake twice because no matter how much I cut the time (I do not have a hot oven) it was dry. I gave up. Then the icing. I did cut the heavy cream down to 1 cup and that didn’t work. It’s the wetness of the strawberries. I have my daughter’s birthday party in three hours and I have a horrible looking sloppy mess for a cake. I am so very annoyed that this recipe was not totally fixed. And before you say it, I did whip the cream a ton. It’s no match for the fruit. Great concept. Terrible recipe.

    1. Hey Elizabeth! I’m sorry this cake didn’t turn out for you. It is a denser cake than say a boxed cake mix, but I’ve never had the problem with it coming out dry. As you can see from the photos, this cake has worked for me each time I’ve made it. However, some other folks have had trouble, and I’ve tried to troubleshoot what could be going wrong. (A number of other folks have also had great success and emailed me photos, too!) In this case, it sounds like your oven might have been too cool? That’s hard to tell without being there, although at this point it doesn’t matter much. I do hope your daughter’s birthday is still a success today, and I wish this cake could have turned out well for you.

  90. Oh my goodness!! I went to LSU and lived in BR for several years after I graduated and this was always my FAVORITE and something I missed so much! I’ve been trying to recreate it for my birthday cake every year since I left. I can’t wait to try your recipe!

    1. Hey there, Melanie! So it sounds like we’re pretty much the exact same. I loved my time at LSU, and I absolutely loved BR and all of south Louisiana. So I obviously don’t have the authentic recipe for this cake, but I wanted to recreate something similar. Despite the fact that I posted this one several years ago, it’s still a work in progress. I like the denseness of the cake (it’s more dense than a boxed white cake mix) as it works well with the light frosting. But the frosting is the problem. The challenge is creating a frosting that’s light and airy, but still firm enough for frosting the sides of the cake. I think it’s pretty close here, but my mother-in-law actually just suggested adding a bit of pudding mix to the frosting to soak up the extra liquid from the diced strawberries. I’m going to give that one a shot later this week…so stay tuned! Oh, and Geaux Tigers!!

  91. Hi! First, I’d like to start by stating I LOVE THIS RECIPE! I made it for two family gatherings back to back and no one could get enough! With all of this being said, I made this both times prior to the *updated* original frosting recipe. I never had a problem with the original recipe not becoming stiff enough. AnywayI could get the original frosting recipe, again?

    1. Hey Austin! First off, thank you so much for the kind words! You know, I’ve never had trouble with that first recipe either. But I kept getting comments that people were having trouble, and some of the comments were downright rude. So I decided to hit the drawing board again and try to solve the problem. After a bunch of different attempts, I just settled on the easiest idea was to include the sliced/diced berries in the cake before spreading the frosting. (That’s the version of the recipe that you see up there now.)

      But…with that said, here is the original, original recipe! I still have it in my notes, and I struggle with how to include it here. I want everyone to share in the deliciousness of this cake without having trouble with the frosting! Thanks again for commenting on the original one, and happy baking, my friend! Here is the very first version of the frosting recipe:

      3 cups heavy cream
      1 (8-oz) package cream cheese, softened
      ¾ cup sugar
      1 Tbsp vanilla extract
      2 pints (2-3 pounds) strawberries, stems and hulls removed

      In a medium bowl, beat the heavy cream until stiff peaks form; set aside. Note: The heavy cream needs to be very well whipped…past the point of ‘standard’ whipped cream, but not as far as butter. Without this, the frosting will be too loose.
      Using an electric mixer, beat the softened cream cheese on high speed until light and fluffy. (Tip: Stop and scrape the sides of the bowl once or twice during this step.)
      Add the sugar and vanilla; beat on medium speed until fully combined.
      Meanwhile, slice ⅓ of the strawberries into thin slices; set aside. Dice the remaining strawberries into smaller pieces.
      Add the diced strawberries to the bowl and mix until fully combined. (Note: The frosting will turn pink; mix until frosting is uniform in color.)
      Remove the bowl from the mixer and fold in the whipped cream with a large spoon or spatula.

  92. Hi!

    The frosting tastes DELICIOUS!!!! But like a lot of people on the board, it’s a runny mess. I think instead of 3 cups of fresh strawberries, it’s should be just one. Lay the strawberries on a napkin to get rid of the moisture. Also, instead of a layered cake, this cake is best in a 13x9x2 glass dish with frosting added to the top. It will be less messy. Otherwise…super yummy!

    1. Hey Vivian! That’s an excellent idea! As you can tell from the notes above in the recipe, I’ve been tinkering and struggling with a way to make this one more “foolproof.” It works for some and not for others…and I’m not ok with that. But the idea of using a napkin to absorb some of the strawberry moisture (plus fewer strawberries in the frosting) is a good one! Plus, making this as a layered cake in a baking dish will definitely solve the problem either way. Thank you for the suggestion, and I’m really glad you enjoy the flavor…it is really, really good! 🙂 Happy baking, my friend!

  93. Hi.

    Anyway you can repost the original strawberry creamcheese frosting or email it to me. The one with white sugar not Powder sugar. The powder sugar is what’s making it runny. I made it numerous times the other way and never had an issue. Problem is that I never printed it out and now you changed it and prefer it the other way.

    Thank you
    Beateice

    1. By the way I failed to mention that my family and I absolutely love this cake with the original strawberry cream cheese frosting.

      Beatrice

    2. Hey there, Beatrice! Thank you so much for leaving this comment. I know a lot of folks loved that original recipe, and many of them left comments above.
      And then my wife reminded me that there are probably a bunch more who didn’t comment since you’re more likely to comment if a recipe doesn’t work out. I feel terrible for the folks who haven’t gotten this recipe to work, and that’s what led to the updated version.

      But with that said, I still have the original recipe in my archives! Here it is: http://spicedblog.com/original-strawberry-cake Will you take a look and see if that looks like the original version you mentioned? Thanks so much, Beatrice! And happy baking once again! 🙂

      1. Hi David.

        Yes this is the original recipe I was looking for. Thank you so much for sending it to me.

        Beatrice

  94. I just use whipped cream instead of whippubg cream and this works perfect every time. Any recipe that calls for whipping cream I immediately substitute for cool whip. Hope this helps.

    1. Hey there, Hannah! That’s a great tip. I like the texture of fresh whipped cream better than whipped topping…but I could totally see how whipped topping would hold up better in a frosting form. I’m going to put your tip as a note in the recipe so other readers see it. Thanks so much for the idea. I really appreciate it! 🙂

    2. Tried it with whipping topping and my frosting was so runny. I was struggling to keep my cake from sliding around. Put it in the freezer going to have to restart on the frosting.

      1. I’m sorry the whipped cream topping was so loose for you, Viktoriya. My thought is that the juiciness of the berries plays a huge factor in how loose the frosting is. I hope you give the cream cheese version a try – it’s much more stable!

  95. Hi David!

    My fiancé and I love this cake, and today I made it for the third time. The first two times I made it, with the original frosting recipe, I never had an issue with it being too runny. It always maintained it’s whipped texture, even when the strawberries were added.

    Today, however, the “original recipe” produced really loose, runny frosting and, although delicious, it was quite difficult to frost the cake. I’m wondering if the very first post of the recipe had a greater amount of heavy cream in the frosting that helped to maintain the whipped texture.

    Whatever that very first recipe was worked for me, and my cake DID turn out like the photos. But not today! I will devour it just the same, but would love to have the original original frosting recipe.

    1. Well – I just looked at the comments immediately above and found my answer. Will use that recipe next time!

      1. Hey there, Rachel! I’m so sorry that this 3rd round didn’t work out. I’m glad you noticed the original recipe, though. 🙂

  96. Greetings!
    I have made this cake many times and love it! I just came back to the recipe and notice that the recipe for the original strawberry whipped cream frosting has been changed. I loved the old recipe and never had a problem with the frosting. Can you please repost the old recipe as well? Thank you!

    1. Hey there, Michelle! You know, you aren’t the first person that has mentioned having success with that old frosting recipe. Judging by the comments, I thought I was the only one that could get that one to work! But I’m actually really happy to hear from folks who enjoyed that original one. I reposted that original recipe here: http://spicedblog.com/original-strawberry-cake Will you take a look and see if that’s the one you were thinking of? Thanks so much! I really do appreciate you visiting my site!!

  97. I can not tell you how excited I am to make this cake. I know exactly what bakery you are referring to. I myself have gone crazy over it seeing as my grandparents are in Baton Rouge. Can’t wait to bring the southern love to my little Utah kitchen! Thank you!

    1. Hey Madison! Oh man, do I miss those days in Baton Rouge! We’re in upstate New York now, so a long, long way from south Louisiana. So this recipe isn’t a copycat version of the one from BR (I don’t have their recipe!), but it is inspired by that recipe. I do hope you enjoy it, and I hope it reminds you of eating strawberry cake with your grandparents! I do recommend taking a look at the comments and notes in the recipe. Some folks have had trouble with the original frosting which is why I recommend just dicing the strawberries instead of putting them into the actual frosting. (Of course, I’ve had a bunch of notes from other folks who say the original frosting worked perfectly!) Either way, enjoy this one and thanks for leaving a comment!!

      1. 5 stars
        I’m going to make the frosting from the original recipe but I’ll add a stabilizer, such as Knox Gelatin, to keep the whipped cream from breaking down. It works very well.

        BTW, I lived in BR back in the early 80’s, and later, on the North Shore of Lake Pontchartain for many years. I live in Virginia now but I miss all the good food from that part of the country so much.

        Thanks for this wonderful recipe!

        1. That’s a great idea to use Knox gelatin to stabilize the whipped cream for this frosting, Patricia. I also miss the food of south Louisiana…but getting in the kitchen and recreating some of our favorites is always a fun time. I hope you enjoy this cake!! 🙂

    1. Hey Jill! Thank you so much for the kind words. 🙂 This cake is indeed delicious, and it’s one of my favorite recipes. It’s been a work-in-progress as I’ve continually tweaked the recipe, but I always make sure to update the post each time. I hope you enjoy this one, and thanks so much for stopping by, my baking friend!

  98. I made this about a year ago for my son’s birthday and I used your original frosting recipe. It was the best frosting I have ever had!! I am not a cake and especially not an icing person, but I loved this one so much that I am making it again for my youngest son’s smash cake. However the frosting… I followed the recipe but it seems it has way too much cream cheese? (I’m making the original) where is the original original recipe?? It worked beautifully and didn’t taste like cream cheese. (I can’t stand cream cheese icing.)

    1. Hey Melinda! Thank you so much for (1) making this cake originally and (2) coming back to make it again. I’ve heard a number of people describe this cake as a cake for folks who don’t like cake. 🙂 As you can tell from the number of comments, I had a bunch of feedback that the original frosting recipe just wasn’t working. I felt terrible about that, so I reworked the recipe into something a bit more foolproof. Then when I updated it, I started getting comments asking for the original recipe again. I should’ve just left it alone. BUT…good news! I managed to dig up the original, original, original version of this post, and I’ve stuck it out here: http://spicedblog.com/original-strawberry-cake I promise I’ll never touch that recipe again. I appreciate the feedback, and I hope your son has a wonderful birthday. Smash cakes are the best…why can’t adults have those, too?? Cheers!

  99. Hi – I just tried making this. Had absolutely no issues with the cake batter, cakes came out great. My problems struck with the cream cheese frosting. I thought I’d try to be clever and set the diced berries to drain some of their juice before I folded them into the frosting. I got nearly 1/3 cup of juice out, and yet the frosting still turned soupy on me. So much for that idea!

    I think it would better if you did not dice the berries, but either chunked them or used larger slices for better juice retention, just as a suggestion.

    1. Hey Jenna! Thanks so much for leaving this feedback. You know, I think you might have finally nailed the problem with this frosting…the amount of juice in the berries. I’ve made this cake probably half a dozen times over the years, and while the frosting is looser than say a traditional buttercream frosting, I’ve never had an issue with it being “soupy” as others have commented. But strawberries can certainly vary with how juicy they are…and that could easily impact the frosting. 1/3 cup of liquid is crazy!

      Good idea about slicing instead of dicing. It might lead to less liquid overall. I’ll put a note in the recipe here about that idea, and I’ll try it next time we make this cake…likely once it finally starts to warm up here in New York. Thanks again for the feedback!

      1. David,
        Has anyone used prepared whipped topping? If so, how much? Love the Ambrosia cake and hope this will rank right up there. Geaux Tigers.

        Jo

        1. Hey Jo! That’s a great question. To my knowledge, no one has tried prepared whipped topping yet. But I bet it would be a great stand-in here! I believe the problem that some folks are having is the juice from the strawberries is making the frosting too loose. But only some people have this problem…so that’s what makes me think it might be the ripeness of the berries. Either way, a prepared whipped topping might be a great idea as it holds up pretty well. (I’ve just never folded diced berries into topping like that, so I can’t say for sure.) If you try it with whipped topping, will you let me know how it works out??

          It’s been years (10+?) since I had a slice of that Ambrosia cake, but I gotta say that this one is pretty darn tasty. And Geaux Tigers!! Thanks, Jo!

  100. Hi, I’ve made this cake 3 times before this and never had a problem with the real “original frosting” recipe. So, I tried the updated version and although it’s good, I like the original one better. Could you send me that one or post the non-updated original recipe so I can use that one next time.

    1. Hey Camrun! Thank you so much for stopping by and leaving a comment. Like you, I’ve never had any trouble with that original recipe, but so many readers were leaving comments with troubles that I decided to rework it to make it more stable. But good news! As soon as I did that, a number of folks (like you!) starting asking for the original one again. So I created a separate page from my archives with that original recipe. https://spicedblog.com/original-strawberry-cake I hope this helps! And don’t hesitate to ask/comment if you have any other thoughts. Enjoy and happy baking!! 🙂

      1. Hi David,

        So excited to try this recipe this weekend for my brother-in-law’s birthday based on all the reviews. I’m going to try the original recipe frosting (from the link above May 2014) but just want to double check if the sugar in that frosting recipe is regular granulated sugar or powdered sugar?

        Thanks!
        Callie

        1. Hey Callie! Awesome – I really hope you enjoy this cake. As you can tell, I’ve toyed with this recipe a couple of times over the years in response to feedback from readers. About half of the folks out there love the original recipe while the other half have left comments saying the frosting didn’t work. It has always worked for me! To answer your question, though, it is granulated sugar. If your berries are super ripe and the frosting is too loose, a bit of powdered sugar should help soak up the extra liquid – just a tip! Happy baking! 🙂

          1. Hi David! I have really great childhood memories from a bday of this certain B.R Bakery and the Fresh Strawberry Cake. Ive never really liked cake and certainly never liked traditional buttercream frostings. So I havent had a birthday cake in 20 years! I was devastated when they told me they don’t ship out of state 🙁 I know its nearly impossible to find an identical dupe since they keep this recipe in the locked vaults but skimming through yours looks to be a good start, especially once I saw the almond extract in the ingredients. How would you say your recipe stacks up in comparison? I’m very excited to try it!

  101. I made the cake and put 3/4 cup of diced strawberries in the batter (1/4 in each layer gently folded in the pan) and about the same amount in the icing (original). I also sliced some strawberries and placed between the layers. All diced or sliced strawberries were placed on a paper towel for a few minutes to soak up some of the juice but not all. It was perfect and didn’t last long with company in for the weekend.

    1. Hey Jo! Great tips about soaking up just a bit of that strawberry juice on paper towels. I’m really glad this cake turned out well for you and the company that was visiting. And I really appreciate you coming back and commenting, too! Thanks so much, my friend! 🙂

  102. Looks and sounds yummy, I will have to give it a try. Lots of egg whites, does that make the cake light and fluffy ???

    I use to make an angel food strawberry cake

    Make angel food cake and cool.
    While cake is baking, cut up about a quart of berries and put in strainer over bowl, cover with plastic and put in fridge.
    Just before serving cut cake into 3 or 4 layers (depending on how tall your cake is)
    Then make stiff whipped cream ( use 1 quart ), adding few tablespoons of the stwby juice before starting to whip, add some Conf sugar and whip to stiff peaks, add in drained berries and stir.
    Fill layers with the strawberry filled whipped cream and serve immediately, cutting with serrated edge knife
    Put rest of whipped cream in bowl for those that want extra strawberry cream, everyone did 🙂

    1. Yes, there are indeed a lot of egg whites in this cake, Mar, but it doesn’t lead to a super fluffy cake. Instead, the cake is a bit on the denser side…think pound cake, but not a full-on pound cake. This is a cake that I’ve had multiple (many even?) people say that they don’t normally like cake, but they like this one. (On a side note, how do people NOT like cake!? Haha!)

      Thanks for sharing those notes for the angel food cake. I love fresh strawberry season, and I like your idea of using a few tablespoons of strawberry juice in the whipped cream…cool concept! 🙂

  103. Hi David,
    I see so many prople have tried this recipe and some struggled with the frosting. I made it & used an 8 oz container of Cool Whip Extra Creamy which was much more stable to work with & turned out wonderful. Everyone loved it & I’ll be adding this to one of my favorite recipe. Thank you for sharing. BJ

    1. Hey BJ! You’re indeed correct that a lot of folks have had trouble with the frosting. I’ve never had that same trouble, but I suspect it’s coming from how much juice is in the actual strawberries. I included a different frosting recipe, and I haven’t heard about much trouble there. But with all of that said, I really appreciate your tip about the Cool Whip here. That would be a nice and easy (and stable) way to frost this cake. I’m glad you enjoyed it…and thanks for coming back to comment, too! 🙂

  104. 5 stars
    This was a huge hit! I did use 2 tsp of Wilton’s clear piping gel when the cream was whipped, to stabilize it. My cake needed to sit overnight and I was worried the whipped cream would lose water. This helps with that a lot! The icing was perfect and delicious. I used the lesser amount of sugar and the cream cheese flavor with the strawberries was really good!
    Strawberries are not yet in season but my sister really wanted a strawberry cake for her birthday so you helped make it happen. Thanks!

    1. Hey there, Mimi! Thank you so much for the tips on stabilizing the whipped cream. I really appreciate it! I’m happy to hear that the cake sat overnight without any trouble at all…and I’m sure other readers will also appreciate these tips! It really does make me happy that your sister enjoyed this cake. 🙂 Happy baking, my friend, and thanks again for taking the time to come back and comment. Cheers!

    1. Hey Alexandra! Thank you so much for the kind comment here. I keep forgetting you are in the opposite season…I was like “wait, it’s almost time for strawberry season to begin!” 🙂 It’s been a long winter here this year, and I can’t wait for some warm weather to return! (P.S. Feel free to send warm weather up my way…thanks.)

  105. 5 stars
    Absolutely delicious. Strawberries are my fav fruit and the dessert is the best dessert I have ever had. My family requests me to make this often.

    1. Awesome! Thank you so much, Lisa! I love this cake, too, and we’re heading into fresh strawberry season…I can’t wait to make this one again here, too. Hope you have a great weekend! 🙂

  106. So I’m just now stumbling upon this recipe and as someone who actually worked at that bakery, I can tell you this isn’t it. I’m sure this one is delicious (I plan to make if for my next cake) and I know this was just inspired by the fresh strawberry cake, but if you’re looking for a copycat, this isn’t the one for you. Hoping this one turns out as delicious as it sounds!

    1. Hey Shelby! I appreciate you stopping by and leaving a comment. As I stated in the post, I don’t have the actual recipe from Ambrosia Bakery, and I don’t claim that this is a copycat. I just used that concept to create my own version, and I have to say that this is a very tasty cake! We make this cake a couple times each spring/summer during fresh strawberry season, and it’s a family favorite! If you’d like to share any tips or tricks from an insider, then I would certainly appreciate it! 🙂 Happy baking, my friend!

  107. 5 stars
    Hello, it looks like the original frosting recipe does not have strawberries mixed in it? Is that correct? the photo looks like there are strawberries mixed in. I can’t wait to make this cake!

    1. Hey Laura! You are absolutely correct with your guess here. The photos show strawberries mixed into the frosting as that’s how I first made this cake. However, a number of readers reported that the frosting was too loose and couldn’t be spread onto the cake. (The other half of the readers reported that the frosting was fine.) With that in mind, I updated the recipe a bit as I hated that readers were making this cake and it wasn’t working out well.

      So now I recommend making the frosting without the strawberries mixed in. My best guess is that the sugar from the frosting was sometimes causing the berries to produce juice (think what happens when you mix strawberries with a little sugar and let them sit). So the easiest way around this possible problem was to make frosting without the strawberries and then sprinkle them on top. The other option is just to go with the cream cheese version that is much stiffer and will frost well. I hope this wasn’t too long-winded of an answer! Happy baking! 🙂

  108. 4 stars
    The cake was wonderful! It was light and airy with a beautiful vanilla flavor. Unfortunately the cream cheese frosting called for 1 1/2 tbsp of vanilla and it made the frosting turn brownish and was much too overpowering. Perhaps it was a typo. I’ve since looked up other cream cheese frosting recipes and I have t found any that call for that much vanilla. Fortunately I tasted the frosting before I ruined the cake with it.

    1. Glad you enjoyed the cake, Asha! If you’re worried about vanilla extract turning the frosting an off-white color, you can always use clear vanilla – that’s what many professional bakeries use.

  109. 5 stars
    I made this today!! I made it exactly as written and even folded the strawberries into the original frosting. It was the best cake and frosting I’ve ever had. Literally delicious. Not too sweet. Light. Held perfectly. Thank you.

    1. Hey Carly! Thanks so much for the comment. 🙂 I love the original version of frosting, too, and I’ve never had one bit of trouble with it. It’s such a fun cake…perfect for early summer evenings, right?? Thanks again!

  110. 5 stars
    Please Help Me, I’m Confused With the Frosting, Which One Of The Frosting Is The Fool Proof One!!!, The Up-Dated (original) Or The Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting!!!This Will Be A Keeper!!!

    1. Hey Carol! I agree that the names are a bit confusing now that I’m looking at them again. The “foolproof” frosting is the 2nd one – the Strawberry Cream Cheese frosting. I hope you enjoy this cake – we’ve always loved it here!

  111. We loved the icing! My daughter did add a little bit more powdered sugar when it was starting to get thin, but we will definitely keep this recipe. Thank you!

    1. Awesome – I’m so glad you enjoyed this recipe, Celia! It is one of our favorites here – especially when the fresh summer strawberries come into season. 🙂 Happy baking!!

  112. I’ve made this before and it was delicious. I’m thinking of trying it again but using flavored shatto strawberry milk! Has anyone tried that yet? If so what was it like?

    1. Hey Cynthia! I’m so glad you enjoyed this cake – it’s one of our favorites, too. As far as the strawberry milk, I think it would work just fine. I looked up Shatto’s strawberry milk, and it’s simply whole milk with strawberry flavor – so it shouldn’t change the baking process at all. Although one thought is that it might turn the cake a bit pinkish – not that it’s a bad thing, though. Let me know if you try that idea out!

  113. 5 stars
    I made it for my son’s birthday, everyone liked it, very nice. I put quite a lot less sugar in the icing though and it was lovely!

  114. 5 stars
    AMAZING!!! I used the original icing recipe. It’s not overly sweet, so it’s really like an amazing strawberry shortcake. I went a little light on the strawberries in the middle, but I know better for next time! It was a hit and I didn’t have any left overs.
    I made it the night before serving and refrigerated it, which i think kind of helped it marinate if that makes sense.
    Can’t wait to make it again! Thank you so much for sharing this!

    1. Awesome! I’m so glad you loved this cake, Emily – it really is great for spring! (Truthfully it’s great any time of the year, but it’s really good when fresh strawberries are in season!) I really appreciate you taking the time to leave a comment here, too. Happy baking (next time)! 🙂

  115. Hi! Love this cake. Just wanted to mention that I use fresh sliced strawberries in between the layers but use freeze dried strawberries (run through the food processor) in the frosting. Works fabulous and tastes great.

    1. Hey Laura! That’s an awesome tip about using freeze dried strawberries in the icing here. I’ll have to keep that in mind next time I make this cake. I appreciate you sharing!! 🙂

  116. I would love a bite of that cake- it looks absolutely beautiful and delicious. Of course strawberries and whipped cream is one of favorites.

    1. Thanks so much for the kind words, Judee! I do love this cake…especially this time of the year when strawberries are at their peak of flavor! 🙂

  117. 5 stars
    This cake us wonderful! I’m going to need a larger cake container. It is just to tall, luckily the strawberries on top keep the lid from resting on the icing. My daughter wanted butter cream icing so that is what we did. I would love to try this again with the whip cream icing.

    1. Ah, that’s a good point about cake containers, Tina! We have a combo cupcake/cake container with a collapsible lid (https://amzn.to/3M2SKkb), and it gives us extra space for storing. Both of the frosting options are quite tasty, and I’m not sure I have a favorite. I’m so glad you enjoyed this recipe – it’s the perfect time of the year for strawberry cake!! 🙂

  118. 5 stars
    Made this as a request for a birthday. Delicious! Texture was great. Thought for sure I messed up because I neglected to follow the directions. Still came out amazing. So good with strawberries. I made a filling of glazed strawberries and used lemon whipped cream as that is what was requested. But this cake…….

    1. I’m so glad you enjoyed this cake, Joanne! It’s always a favorite in our house, and we usually make it at least once or twice each summer. That’s a great idea about the lemon whipped cream! I’ll have to try that next time. And thanks for coming back to comment, too! 🙂

  119. 5 stars
    I just came across this recipe and decided to make it for a potluck luncheon. It was a huge hit! I got asked at least a dozen times for the recipe. I used the cream cheese frosting because of the comments on the original frosting. I didn’t want to take chances, but I will try it the next time I make this for my family.

    Thank you so much!

    1. Hey Maggie! I’m so glad you gave this recipe a try, and I’m VERY glad that it was a hit at your potluck. Thanks for coming back and leaving a comment. I do like that whipped cream frosting myself, but it seems hit-or-miss for some folks, and I’ve never been able to figure out why. Perhaps it has something to do with how juicy the berries are?? Either way, I’m glad you liked the cream cheese version!

  120. Hi David… I’ve been looking forward to trying this recipe for so long. The Ambrosia cake was the only cake I’ve ever liked and it was so many years ago…. so I have my fingers crossed this one lives up to it. I dream about this cake lol. In your opinion is the original icing recipe the one that comes closest to the bakery version? Do you think adding a small amount of stabilizer such as gelatin or cornstarch could help keep a thick frosting consistency without affecting taste?

    1. Hey Christina! I do hope you enjoy this cake. We make this cake 1-2 times a year here, and it’s always a favorite! I do think the ‘original’ recipe is the closest to the Ambrosia version. It is a looser whipped cream frosting, but I’ve never had too much trouble with it. I just ‘overwhip’ the whipped cream. However, I’ve seen the comments over the years that the frosting doesn’t work for others. My only guess there is some berries are just juicier than others, and a little bit more liquid would make a big difference in the consistency of the frosting. I’ve seen others mention using a stabilizer in the frosting, and it’s worked well. I would say add a bit of gelatin just to be safe – it certainly can’t hurt and I don’t think it will affect the taste. Let me know how it turns out!! Of course, let me know if you have any other questions, too. 🙂 Happy Baking!

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