Vanilla Birthday Cake with Old-Fashioned Vanilla Buttercream
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This classic white cake is soft, moist, and tender, with fluffy vanilla buttercream frosting—perfect for birthdays and every celebration in between.
I’ve made this simple vanilla cake every year for my daughter’s birthday since she was two years old. The cake portion of recipe is adapted from one of my favorite baking books, Perfect Cakes by Nick Malgieri, and the vanilla buttercream frosting comes from my great-grandmother’s recipe box.
“Everyone who ate this cake raved about it! This recipe reminds me of the cakes I ate as a kid.”
What you’ll need to make vanilla birthday cake
Step-by-Step Instructions
Step 1: Mix dry ingredients. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
Step 2: Cream butter and sugar. Beat the softened butter and sugar until very light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.
Step 3: Mix liquid ingredients. In a bowl or large measuring cup, combine the egg whites and milk. Whisk well to combine.
Pro tip: Be sure the eggs are at room temperature, otherwise your batter may curdle. (To warm them up quickly, place them in a bowl of hot water before cracking them.)
Step 4: Alternate wet and dry ingredients. Beat in the vanilla and almond extract, then add one-quarter of the flour mixture and beat on low speed. Next, add one-third of the milk/egg mixture. Continue alternating adding the flour and milk mixtures, scraping down the bowl as necessary.
The finished batter should be completely smooth.
Step 5: Fill the pans. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pans and smooth the tops.
Step 6: Bake and cool. Bake the layers for 25 to 30 minutes, until they are set and a cake tester comes out clean. Cool the layers in the pans for five minutes, then unmold onto racks to finish cooling.
Step 7: Make the frosting. While the cake cools, in the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter and cream cheese until well combined. Gradually add the confectioners’ sugar, beating until smooth, then beat in the vanilla and salt. If the frosting is too thick, add 1 to 2 tablespoons of milk or cream.
Step 8: Frost the cake. Once the layers are completely cool, ice the cake. You can spread the frosting smooth, or swirl it casually with a butter knife. I like to scatter some festive nonpareils or confetti sprinkles on the edges for color. Or for a change, try topping the cake with heaps of shredded sweetened coconut—it’s amazing.
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Vanilla Birthday Cake with Old-Fashioned Vanilla Buttercream
Ingredients
For the Cake Layers
- 2 cups all-purpose flour, spooned into measuring cup and leveled-off
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¾ cup (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
- 1½ cups granulated sugar
- 6 large egg whites, at room temperature
- ¾ cup whole milk, at room temperature
- 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon almond extract
For the Buttercream
- ¾ cup (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
- 4 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
- 6 cups confectioners' sugar
- 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
- Pinch salt
Instructions
For the Cake
- Preheat to 350°F (175°C) and set an oven rack in the middle position. Spray two 8-in (20-cm) cake pans with nonstick cooking spray. Cut two 8-in (20-cm) rounds of parchment paper and line the bottom of each pan; spray the paper with nonstick spray. (To measure the parchment paper, just trace the bottom of the pan.)
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
- Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of a heavy-duty mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and beat on medium speed for about 5 minutes, or until very soft and light. Beat in the vanilla and almond extracts.
- Meanwhile, whisk together the egg whites and milk by hand in a medium bowl until just combined.
- Reduce the mixer speed to low and beat in one-quarter of the flour mixture, then one-third of the milk mixture, stopping and scraping down the bowl and beater after each addition. Beat in another quarter of the flour, then another third of the milk mixture. Scrape again. Repeat with another quarter of the flour and the remaining milk mixture; scrape. Finally, beat in the remaining flour mixture.
- Scrape the bowl with a large rubber spatula. Don't worry if the the batter looks a little grainy. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pans and smooth the tops.
- Bake the cakes for 25 to 30 minutes, until they are set and a toothpick inserted into the center emerges clean. Cool the cakes in the pans on rack for 5 minutes, then unmold onto rack to finish cooling right side up (keep parchment paper underneath cake layers so they don't stick to rack). When cake layers are completely cool, transfer to cake plate and frost with vanilla buttercream. (I always flip the bottom layer of the cake so that the domed side is facing down and touching the plate. That way, the surface that you're icing is flat and will minimize any separating between the two layers when you put the other layer on top of it.)
For the Vanilla Buttercream
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and cream cheese until creamy and well combined.
- Gradually add the confectioners' sugar, then beat in the vanilla and salt. If the frosting is too thick, add 1 to 2 tablespoons of milk or cream.
Notes
Nutrition Information
This website is written and produced for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and the nutritional data on this site has not been evaluated or approved by a nutritionist or the Food and Drug Administration. Nutritional information is offered as a courtesy and should not be construed as a guarantee. The data is calculated through an online nutritional calculator, Edamam.com. Although I do my best to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures should be considered estimates only. Varying factors such as product types or brands purchased, natural fluctuations in fresh produce, and the way ingredients are processed change the effective nutritional information in any given recipe. Furthermore, different online calculators provide different results depending on their own nutrition fact sources and algorithms. To obtain the most accurate nutritional information in a given recipe, you should calculate the nutritional information with the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.
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Hi Jenn,
Long time reader, first time commenter. I absolutely love all of your recipes–you never disappoint!
Two questions:
1. I used this buttercream frosting with your vanilla cupcake recipe. Do I need to refrigerate the cupcakes eventually? I’ve read conflicting things about baked goods with buttercream.
2. For some reason, the cupcakes tasted SO MUCH better the next day after they had been sitting in an airtight container overnight. Why is that? Google hasn’t really given a useful explanation. I’ve noticed this with other baked good as well, like cookies.
Thanks very much! I’m sure my son will love these for his birthday tomorrow 🙂
Hi Kelly, so glad you like the recipes! Your answers:
1. While technically these should be refrigerated because of the ingredients in the frosting, I never do and it’s always perfectly fine.
2. I happen to think that cupcakes are best on the first day when they’re the freshest so it’s hard for me to say. Maybe the flavors have had a little bit more time to meld??
Good Morning Jenn,
My grandson wants me to make him a lemon birthday cake. Would I be able to adapt this one, and I would think, the frosting as well?
Thank you,
Doreen
Hi Doreen, You could swap out the almond and/or vanilla extract in the batter for lemon extract and add a teaspoon of lemon zest to give this cake a lemon flavor. If you’re looking for a true lemon cake, I’d recommend this one<. Hope your grandson enjoys whatever you make 🙂
Thank you Jenn!
I love how this recipe uses egg whites (and I can save the yolks for ice cream). I also appreciate how your recipes and site allows you to toggle between metric and cups measurements that can otherwise be confusing! 🙂
My family and I love Jen’s recipes but found this icing recipe to be unbearably sweet. I would recommend starting with two cups of icing sugar and increasing from there. I used a 9-inch pan and cooked it for 35 minutes. It did not rise much but not sure if it was due to the increased pan size.
Jenn is usually my go-to so I expected this to be a hit….unfortunately it was very dry. I was careful with measuring and watched the time.
I won’t make it again. Something nice : the icing was good!
Jenn is my secret weapon in the kitchen, and I love everything she does, but for some reason this cake was not a home run for us. I did use two 9” cake pans (and baked for less time) which gave the cake less height, but for some reason the cake was too dense for our taste. I followed measurements and procedures very carefully, and my batter looked exactly like the pictures, but sadly we did not love this cake at all. Frosting was sweet and wonderful, but the rest left a lot to be desired. Cakes can be hard, so maybe a couple more tries might get it right. Every recipe of Jenn’s is so incredible, I was beginning to think there was some black magic in these recipes. Thankfully this one threw me off! 😉
LOVE IT, MY NEW GO-TO SCRATÇH VANILLA CAKE RECIPE. Love the flavor and texture! The only ingredient I left out was the almond extract, bc I didn’t have any. But, if you’re going to make this one, be sure to follow the instructions and ingredients TO A TEE! Things like salted vs. unsalted butter and using cold ingredients vs room temperature ones can give u very unsatisfactory results! I guarantee if you follow this recipe correctly you will love the results!
I love this blog and have many recipes saved from it that I’ve made more than once, but this one didn’t work for me as the cake tasted very much like cornbread.
Same thing happened to me 🙁
Can I make this cake the night before?
Hi Alex, it’s at its best the day it’s made, but you can get away with the night before. Hope you enjoy!
Hi! What happens to the egg yolks? Do they just go to waste or can they be used in this recipe?
Hi ET, they can’t be used in this recipe. If you don’t want them to go to waste, you can use them for Creme Anglaise. It would be nice on these molten chocolate cakes. Hope that helps!
Hi Jenn,
How do you think this would do in a 13×9?
Hi Mary, It should work but if you’d like a vanilla cake that’s made in that sized pan, I’d recommend this one. Hope that helps and that you enjoy if you make it!