How To Make the Best White Cake from Scratch

A white cake with white frosting is nothing short of stunning. It’s the cake of choice for weddings and formal parties, prized for its bright white layers and light-as-a-feather texture. It’s practically impossible to dislike, with a rich vanilla flavor that goes well with anything.

This step-by-step recipe will guide you through making a perfect white cake from scratch. Think of it as a blank canvas for creating the cake of your dreams: Use the recipe as the base of a Funfetti cake, or layer it with fresh fruit. Or, keep it classic and frost it in vanilla buttercream. You really can’t go wrong.

White cakes are most commonly served at weddings or used as the base of Funfetti cake to help the colorful sprinkles pop. Unlike most standard vanilla cake recipes, white cake is made with just the egg whites and not the egg yolks. This helps keep the cake pure white, because you’ve omitted the orange hue of the yolks. Some recipes also use shortening in place of or in addition to butter for an even whiter color, although our recipe sticks to butter to give the cake a richer flavor.

Read more: What’s the Difference Between White, Yellow, and Vanilla Cake?

Pure vanilla extract (the stuff you likely keep on hand for baking) has a brown hue that will give your cake a slight beige color. If you’re okay with that, go ahead and use it here. But if you want the whitest cake possible, we recommend using clear vanilla extract. Clear vanilla extract is a synthetic type of vanilla flavoring that gives the cake a rich vanilla flavor without any color. The flavor is a bit different than pure vanilla extract, tasting a bit like boxed vanilla cake mix versus real vanilla.

Buy: Watkins Clear Vanilla Flavor Extract, $8.02

Before you head into the kitchen, keep these tips in mind.

1. Make sure your butter is completely softened. Unlike most cakes, the butter here gets combined with sugar and vegetable oil, so you want to make sure it’s soft enough to be able to thoroughly combine with the oil. We recommend letting your butter sit out at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before using it for the best results.

2. Don’t over-whip your egg whites. You want to whip your egg whites just until they hold stiff peaks. This usually takes three to five minutes depending on the mixer you use. If you over-whip your egg whites you run the risk of them deflating, getting grainy, and separating. As soon as your egg whites are stiff, turn the mixer off and stop.

3. Don’t worry if the outside of your cakes look a bit golden-brown. It’s perfectly normal for the cakes to brown on the outside, so don’t be nervous if they look a bit golden when they come out of the oven. The inside will still be perfectly white and you won’t be able to tell once the cake is frosted.