Strawberry Shortcake Cake

Strawberry Shortcake Cake is a rustic vanilla layer cake filled with a whipped cream cheese frosting and fresh strawberries. Easy, impressive, and SO good!

Is saying Strawberry Shortcake Cake redundant? Possibly. But when I think of Strawberry Shortcake, I think of individual angel food cakes or shortcakes with whipped cream and diced strawberries. This isn’t those. This cake has been upgraded. 

STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE CAKE

I did take a shortcut with a boxed French Vanilla cake mix, but the whipped cream cheese frosting is from scratch and the strawberries are super fresh.

Let’s talk about the strawberries. This pregnancy has had me craving a bowl of fresh fruit every night. Namely raspberries, but the past couple weeks, the strawberries have been so good, I switched over.

Yesterday, we went to the new Busch’s Fresh Food Market that opened in Canton. Metro Detroiters, I’m sure you’re familiar with Busch’s. I live in between two of them and frequent them often, but this new one? It’s special. It’s fancy and beautiful and I’m a little jealous it’s 25 minutes from my house.

We grabbed fresh, local apples for the week and those strawberries caught my attention and inspired this cake.

Tons of fresh, local, organic choices in a pretty setting.

Plus, a Starbucks right in the market. An olive oil bar. Lots of baked goods made in-house (we grabbed some cookies).

More fruit options to tempt me, local cider, and some of the prettiest flowers I’ve ever seen.

Overall, it’s a gorgeous market. There’s also a BBQ restaurant inside and a full hot food bar and cold foods/salad bar. It would be great for grabbing lunch during the workday or grabbing dinner on the way home.

Back to my cake. I used those fresh strawberries I picked up and loaded them into this cake.

Tips for making this cake a success:

• I used a French Vanilla cake mix but you could use angel food, yellow, or even white. Whichever you prefer.
• To easily flip the cakes out of the pans, trace the pan onto a piece of parchment paper, cut out your circle, and lay it into the pans before greasing so they easily pop out.
• Before making your whipped cream, start with a really cold bowl. I like to pop my metal bowl into the freezer for about 10 minutes before I start so it’s fully chilled. Cream whips much better when cold.
• I piped the frosting on, just using a zip top bag, because it’s so easy and I think it looks nice, but you could also just spread it with a spatula.

Things you may need…
Cake stand (I think this one is pretty)
9″ cake pans
Metal mixing bowls
You can BUY the parchment paper liners I mentioned above instead of DIYing – news to me!

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Strawberry Shortcake Cake

Strawberry Shortcake Cake is a rustic vanilla layer cake filled with a whipped cream cheese frosting and fresh strawberries. Easy, impressive, and SO good!

Servings: 12 servings

Author: Melissa | Persnickety Plates

Ingredients

• For the cake
• 1 box French Vanilla cake mix
• 3 eggs
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 1/2 cup butter at room temp
• For the frosting/filling
• 1 brick 8 oz cream cheese, at room temp
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 pint heavy whipping cream
• 1 quart fresh strawberries rinsed and sliced

Instructions

1. For the cake
2. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 9" round cake pans (use my parchment paper trick from above) and sprinkle bottom and sides of pans with sugar and set aside.
3. In a large bowl, add the cake mix, eggs, water, and softened butter. Use a hand mixer (or stand mixer) to beat on low until moistened and then on medium for two minutes, until fully combined.
4. Pour evenly into prepared pans and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
5. Let cool in pans then flip onto cooling racks to cool completely.
6. Trim the tops with a serrated knife, if necessary, to make the two cakes even.
7. For the frosting/filling
8. In a medium bowl, add the softened cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla and mix with a hand mixer until smooth.
9. In a small mixing bowl that has been chilled (see my note above), add the heavy cream and beat on high until stiff peaks form.
10. Gently fold the whipped cream into the cream cheese mixture.
11. Put the frosting into a large zip top bag and snip off the tip.
12. Spread half of the frosting on top of the first layer of cake. Top with half of the sliced strawberries.
13. Place the top layer of cake onto the strawberries and pipe on the remaining frosting. Arrange the remaining strawberries onto the top of the cake.
14. Slice and enjoy!

Recipe Notes

Recipe adapted from an old Duncan Hines cookbook

Store any leftover cake in the fridge.

If you’re not already a MyWay member (I have been for years), sign up for exclusive coupons right to your inbox and a chance to win FREE groceries.

Locals (especially those of you in Canton) – check out the new Busch’s Market. I promise you’ll be impressed. If you’ve already been, let me know how you liked it!

Other ways to use strawberries in desserts:

Easter Egg Fruit Pizza (Easter’s coming right up)

Strawberry Pretzel Jell-O