Homemade Classic Yellow Cake
“An all-butter, classic yellow cake that’s tender and moist! Easy homemade recipe using simple ingredients!”
Visual learner? Watch me make this Classic Yellow Cake from start to finish!
Do you have any food pet peeves? Whether it’s the way people pronounce things like “minlk instead of milk” or a dead wrong pairing like grits with sugar? I have so many. I normally keep them to myself but sometimes I just have to vent.
One food pet peeve I have is when people call yellow cake vanilla cake. I know, what’s the big deal right? I try my best to ignore it but look, it’s just not a vanilla cake okay. Whew. I feel better.
Although the subtle, yellow cake is truly in a class by itself. That gorgeous natural yellow color and that buttery-vanilla taste and aroma and that perfectly moist and tender crumb. It’s a classic and everyone should have a tried and true recipe!
I posted one of my favorite tried and true yellow cake recipes a few years ago and it’s become the most infamous recipe on my blog. Some people LOVE IT (me included) and some people HATE IT! The funny thing is, after talking to other food bloggers, their yellow cakes are also pretty infamous.
What’s up with that!?! I’m convinced you have to hold your mouth a certain way and twerk while mixing it. The most common mistake reported with that recipe was the middle sinking.
I thought about removing the recipe but figured that wouldn’t be fair to those who love it and it really is still my favorite yellow cake recipe.
So I decided to troubleshoot. I’ve been trying to troubleshoot that cake for years! Yes, YEARS!!! I’m a stubborn Taurus and there is just something about recipes (if they mess up) that provides a challenge that I must accept!
Unfortunately, I just can not get that yellowcake to mess up! I’ve tried mixing at a high speed, over mixing, stomping while the cake is in the oven (my grandmother never let us kids go in the kitchen when a cake was baking) and all sorts of things, yet the cake was like “Still I rise!”
However, as promised, I’ve got another yellow cake recipe that I think will be a hit for all.
It’s a bit more stable with all-purpose flour, more leavening, more sugar, and a couple of extra yolks to kick up the fat content. Fat and moisture is a yellow cakes friend. It’s a classic all-butter yellow cake but I’ve also bumped up the buttery flavor even more by adding in some butter flavoring. That’s optional, but yummers!
I’ve made this cake four times so far and my boys prefer this one over the other one. I really do love them both! The first yellow cake has a very light and fluffy texture (almost melt in your mouth style) with an all-butter flavor. This new yellow cake recipe is fluffy but with a tighter crumb.
This yellow cake recipe tastes more like the kind my grandmother makes. For some reason, I prefer the crumb of this cake on day 2. It gets a bit tighter and moister, just be careful not to overbake!
I used this Old-Fashioned Chocolate Frosting to frost this yellow cake! Get it here!
Get the Recipe: Homemade Classic Yellow Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup unsalted butter, 2 sticks, softened, do not melt
- 2 eggs, room temperature
- 2 yolks, room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon butter flavoring, optional
- 1 cup buttermilk, room temperature
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325 F.
- Line the bottom of two, round 9-inch cake pans with a parchment paper circle. Grease and lightly flour the pans. Set aside.
- In a medium-size bowl, sift together flour baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
- In a large bowl cream together sugar and butter.
- Mix in eggs and yolks, one at a time, mixing after each egg.
- Mix in vanilla extract and butter flavoring.
- Add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, alternating with the buttermilk.
- Mix until batter is fluffy, being sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl. (batter will be thick)
- Let batter rest for 5 minutes.
- Pour batter evenly into prepared pans and use an offset spatula to spread into an even layer.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes (may need a tad bit longer) or until golden around the edges and moist crumbs cling to a toothpick inserted into the center.
- Place on a cooling rack until pans are warm enough to touch and then carefully remove cake from pans and allow to cool completely.
- Frost with chocolate frosting.
Video
Hello Monique, This is Monique from New York I made your Homemade Classic Yellow cake and your old fashioned chocolate frosting several times, it came out perfect. We love your recipe. I’m making one tonight actually. Thank you so much for sharing your recipes. My cakes always comes out fluffy and moist just like yours. I love you, you’re the best. Monique
I used your yellow cake recipe as a cornbread recipe. We like our cornbread a little sweet. This worked great and was super moist. I hate dry and crumbly cornbread!
I replaced the flour with 1/2 bread flour and 1/2 yellow cornmeal. I also cut the recipe in the half. That was all the changes. So yummy and cannot wait to try this recipe as a cake with that chocolate frosting!
Hi, do you have this yellow cake recipe for a 12×18 sheet cake?
Where is the yellow sheet cake recipe? I need to know for a 12×18 pan.
I grew up eating my grandmother’s caramel cake with the condensed milk boiled in a can. She never had her recipes written down this cake is close to hers. I really love your recipes! So well written!!! Your cakes do not let me down!
I made this and the texture and flavor were great. However, the cake did sink a little in the middle and it was not yellow but more of a brown color. I didn’t deviate from ingredients. Do you know why it came out light brown?
Hi. So fun to watch you make this Homemade Classic Yellow (Buttermilk) Cake, and I followed your recipe to a tee, but the cake came out flat. It was buttery and delicious anyway, but I wonder what I did wrong? Any thoughts?
If you don’t bake regularly, your baking powder and/or baking soda may have gone flat. Thus, no leavening action in the batter.
Years ago I baked a family favorite cake (not this one), and the batter never cooked properly. It took a little research, but I deduced that since it had been almost a year since I’d baked anything, it had to be the baking soda/powder.
Try purchasing new products if it’s been awhile since the containers were opened.
Gonna try this for cupcakes for my son!
I made this yellow cake today alone with the chocolate icing. They both came out perfect, I’m to make it again. Thanks, for sharing.
Hi, I would like to make this cake but I want to have the metric measurements for this. Can you give me the measurements in grams?
How do you make adjustments for a 3 layer cake instead of a 2 layer cake.
Made this cake baking it again today hope it comes out as goooooood as the last time
This cake came out perfect! It’s absolutely delicious! I will never make a yellow box cake mix again!! I made it with the chocolate frosting shared with this recipe. To die for!! Only changes I made was I didn’t have buttermilk, so I made my own and I didn’t have butter flavoring so I left it out. DELICIOUS! Just be sure to follow the recipe with the room temperature ingredients, it makes all the difference. I’m not a big cake lover but my son wanted to bake me a cake for my birthday and we chose this. Can’t wait to have another slice!!
I don’t have buttermilk on hand. Can I make my own? Will that effect the cake?
You can mix regular milk with vinegar and let the vinegar sit for 10-15 minutes
Another possible trick is to put a metal decorating tool used for making icing flowers upside down in the middle the pan before pouring in the batter. Helps to disperse the heat in the middle of cakes.
I made this cake and it came out great! it was moist light and fluffy.
I just made this cake for my daughter’s birthday. I followed the recipe exactly as written minus the butter flavoring. It was perfect – no sinking or anything. In my oven it took about 40 minutes. The taste on this cake is incredible! I don’t really love Yellow Cake but it’s what my daughter asked for – I was afraid it would be a bit boring but WOW! This cake is super flavorful and may have just converted me into a yellow cake lover 🙂
The cake came out light and fluffy. I used 2-8 inch cake pans.
I also took the left over egg whites beat them stiff and folded them into the cake batter.
I just made this cake and it sunk in from the edges while cooling in the pan. I followed the recipe exactly. What could cause this to happen? Over beating?
What position was your oven rack at? I have a chocolate cake recipe that I adore and this happens to my cake if the oven rack is set at the middle position or higher. Try lowering your oven rack to the just below the middle position or lower. When the top of the cake is closer to the heating element it will bake the top of the cake faster than the bottom making it hard for the cake to support its own weight.
Hi, I would like to ask how tall the cake bake up to? How many cm/ inches?
how would I convert this into a white cake instead of a yellow cake?
Just curious…. I’m at high altitude and wondering if there should be something added? I can’t get the cake to rise properly. Thanks in advance!
Divascancook this classic yellow cake was a hit in my family tonight!! We had a big dinner with the cake for dessert. It was absolutely delicious and went over well. Very moist also. Can I use salted butter instead of unsalted next time? Which will be real soon Keep up the good work! Thank you much
You dont want to use salted butter because you cant control the salt being put into the cake. It’s better to use unsalted so you can control the salt level and taste. Using salted butter will make your cake very salty.
I usually use salted butter in baking (it’s a southern thing) and omit any additional salt and my baked goods come out Fantastic and Flavorful. Just be sure to leave out the 1/2 teaspoon of salt in this recipe and it should be fine.
This is the second a recipe I used of yours: carrot cupcakes and yellow cake however both came out too moist if that makes since like oily but both were still delicious!!!! I don’t know what I’m doing wrong I consider myself a level 2 baker. I’m going to keep trying and tweeking so thanks….
I have taken a cake making class about 5 years ago l learned that you can’t open the oven for the first 20 minutes because your cake will fall and sink in the middle
This recipe was excellent!
I can’t wait to try this with caramel icing.
Since you used cake flour
Did u use baking powder and baking soda
Love love love. This is the best home made yellow cake recipe I have ever made. It has been my go to all year!! I haven’t tried your old recipe yet… I want to get around to it one day but this one is so good it’s hard to get away from. ^_^ Thank you for the delicious recipes, Monique!
This recipe is JUST like my granny use to make. THE BOMB!!!!! My sister has perfected my granny’s icing (frosting). Yummy yum yum!
Hey Girl!!
This looks good but I was wondering… Can I use Brown sugar , Coconut sugar or some other substitute for grandulated sugar?
This cake was so good! Mine turned out kinda dense. Any thoughts on how to prevent that?
You probably beat the batter too much.
I would try making it again just to see if u may have went heavy or to light on a ingredient.
I made this for after dinner tonight but added coco powder was like a chocolate moose fluffy and yummm thanks for sharing this recipe
I made this cake 4 the 1st time last night….hunni…lemme tell u sumthin…..absolutely my go 2 yellow cake recipe. Tks!!!
I made this recipe following the exact directions. This is a very moist yellow cake, but it’s not nearly as flavorful as Monique’s other yellow cake (the one that everyone has trouble with). I would suggest making the other yellow cake and adding parchment paper to the pan to prevent the cake from breaking which is the problem most people had
Can I use this recipe for cupcakes too?
Yes you can, I have.
May I add chop pecans to this recipe and if so, should I use 1 or 1/2 cup?
Ok I’m little slow so I would need 4 eggs total? 2 eggs and then 2 more eggs for just the yolk?
A*
Yep 4 eggs total!
It says 2 eggs and 2 yolks.
I made this recipe last night and I LOVE this recipe! The butter extract is needed and what I was missing when trying to make a yellow cake from scratch. Also, I used cake flour instead and this recipe is IT! I used homemade strawberry cream cheese frosting for the cake. Actually I used your REAL cream cheese frosting recipe and just added strawberries. Thank you Monique. You never fail!