Strawberry Champagne Cake- A Doctored Cake Mix
This Strawberry Champagne Cake is the perfect way to celebrate, and with New Year's Eve just around the corner we are excited to share this moist and flavorful layer cake recipe with you!
Strawberries and champagne go hand in hand, and this impressive (yet easy) cake recipe has the perfect balance of both!
We've made a scratch Strawberries and Champagne Cake in the past, which is another recipe for your must-make list, but I love the additional strawberry flavor in todays recipe, and the convenience of using a cake mix is a wonderful time-saving bonus!
This cake is soft, fluffy, and moist- and the whipped cream and strawberries in the filling take it to another level of deliciousness.
While this strawberry champagne cake starts with a simple white cake mix, the special additions that the recipe calls for makes it truly unique.
Table of Contents
How to Make a Strawberry Champagne Cake
*You can find the full, printable recipe below, but here is a quick rundown of the steps!
We started with a Betty Crocker Moist White Cake Mix. Go with your favorite brand, I actually thought I was picking up a Duncan Hines box in the store, haha but I love how this recipe turned out just the same.
Ignore the directions on the back of the box and follow our recipe instructions. We combined the dry ingredients first, including the cake mix, a half box of strawberry jello powder for strawberry flavor, flour, sugar, and baking powder.
Then, we mixed in the melted butter, egg whites, oil, vanilla, and let it mix for two minutes.
After mixing, I folded in about ½ cup of thinly sliced fresh strawberries and divided the batter between three 8 inch cake pans.
After baking, we cooled the cake layers in the pans for about 5 minutes on cooling racks before flipping them out.
Freezing the Cake Layers
Wrapping and freezing cake layers while they are still warm is optional, but I do this step whenever possible no matter what cake recipe I am making.
I find that the trapped moisture from wrapping the warm cakes and freezing them creates cakes that are even more moist!
After baking the cake layers, I allow them to cool in the pans on baking racks for about 5 minutes as mentioned above. I then flip them out, each on their own foil-wrapped cake board (so that the boards can be re-used).
While the cake layers are still warm, I then wrap each individual layer in plastic wrap followed by foil and into the freezer they go! You can freeze the layers for just a few hours or up to a few months!
When you are ready to assemble your cake, thaw the wrapped layers on the countertop until condensation forms on the foil. Then unwrap and continue to thaw. (It is fine to assemble the cake when the layers are partially frozen.)
Assembling the Strawberry Champagne Cake
- Place the first cake layer on the cake base or pedestal. Then, pipe a dam of champagne buttercream around the cake layer, about ¼ inch from the edge. Fill with sliced strawberries (optional) and a layer of whipped cream filling.
- Repeat the above step with the next layer, and top with the final cake layer.
- Frost the cake with champagne buttercream and top with additional strawberries!
Other Boozy Cake Recipes
We've made several delicious "boozy" cakes over the years from champagne cakes to cocktail-inspired cakes and more!
Here's a quick list of favorites below, but for more details, hop over to our collection of Favorite Boozy Cake Recipes!
- Pink Champagne Cake from Scratch
- Pink Champagne Cake- Doctored Cake Mix Recipe
- Margarita Cake with Tequila Lime Buttercream
- Bailey's Irish Cream Cake
- Black Forest Cake Recipe
- Champagne and Strawberries Cake Recipe
- Chocolate Kahlua Cake
- Piña Colada Cake
More Strawberry Cakes
We have many more strawberry cakes to share with you as well! Some of our favorites are our homemade Strawberry Cake Recipe, Strawberry Pound Cake, Strawberry Lemonade Cake , and Strawberry Cake from a Box Mix.
Strawberry Champagne Cake- A Doctored Cake Mix
This Strawberries and Champagne Cake is so easy and delicious- and it all starts with a simple cake mix! It works great for cupcakes too!
Ingredients
For the Strawberry Champagne Cake
- 1 box white cake mix (sifted), we used Betty Crocker (15.25 oz)
- 1 cup (121 g) all-purpose flour
- 1 cup (200g) granulated Sugar
- 1 ½ sticks (12T) (179g) unsalted Butter, Melted
- 4 Egg whites (large eggs)
- 1 teaspoon (5g) baking powder
- ½ teaspoon (3g) salt
- ½ small box of strawberry jello (We used 1.5 oz of the jello-- a small box is 3 oz)
- 1 teaspoon (4g) vanilla extract
- 2 Tablespoons (16g) vegetable oil
- 1 ¼ cups (302g) Champagne (Whatever brand you like- we used André- Extra Dry)
- ½ cup finely sliced strawberries (Plus additional for in between layers and whole strawberries for the top.)
Sweetened Whipped Cream Filling
- 1 cup (240g) heavy cream
- ¼ (29g) cup powdered sugar
- 1 (4g) teaspoon vanilla
For the Champagne Buttercream
- 3 sticks (339g) unsalted butter
- 7 ½ cups (863g) Powdered Sugar
- ¼ cup +2 Tablespoons (84g) Champagne
- ½ teaspoon (2g) vanilla
- pinch salt
Instructions
For the Strawberry Champagne Cake Layers
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees (F). Grease and flour three 8 inch cake pans. In the bowl of your mixer add the sifted cake mix, flour, sugar, baking powder, half of small box strawberry jello, and salt.
- Whisk at least 30 seconds to combine ingredients. Add the melted butter, egg whites, vegetable oil, vanilla, and champagne.
- With the mixer on low speed, increasing to medium speed, mix for two minutes.
- Fold in the sliced strawberries.
- Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl and divide the batter between the three prepared 8 inch cake pans. Bake for approximately 30-35 minutes (check at 30 minutes).
- This recipe makes about 7 ½ cups of batter. Makes great cupcakes also!
For the Sweetened Whipped Cream Filling
- Chill the mixing bowl and beaters/ whisk attachment in the freezer for 10 minutes.
- Pour the whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla into the chilled mixing bowl, begin beating on low speed gradually increasing to medium high speed.
- The cream begins to thicken (approx. 1 ½ minutes) and soft peaks form....peaks that slightly bend over. Watch closely as this happens quickly. Do not over beat.
For the Champagne Buttercream Frosting
- Cream the softened butter until smooth and lightened in color
- Blend in the salt and vanilla
- Gradually add the powdered sugar with the champagne until the powdered sugar is incorporated.
- Beat at medium speed 3 to 4 minutes. The texture will become very smooth.
- To make the frosting a little thinner, add either a bit more champagne or milk/cream. If you need to thicken, add in a little more powdered sugar.
To Assemble The Cake
- Place the first cake layer on your cake base or pedestal.
- Pipe a dam of buttercream around the cake layer, about ¼ inch from the edge. (I do this with a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away). Optional: Add desired amount of sliced strawberries on top of the cake layer. Top with a layer of whipped cream.
- Repeat the above steps for the next cake layer.
- Top with the final cake layer and frost the cake with Champagne Buttercream as desired.
- Top with additional strawberries.
Notes
This cake should be refrigerated because of the strawberries and whipped cream in the recipe.
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Looks pretty! Sounds delish! :-)
YUM! can't wait to try for my new years celebration!
Would this cake recipe be sturdy enough to be able to make as a two tier cake?
Hi Rosa, yes this would work fine for a two tier- of course you'll want to add supports beneath the top tier as usual.
Can you taste the champagne?
I made this cake for New Year’s Day, it was so delicious. If you love strawberry shortcake you’ll love this cake. I will be making it again and again. Everyone that ate the cake, loved it
Hi Sheila! Thanks so much for your comment, I'm so glad that you all loved the cake! Happy New Year ;0)
Hello! I found your recipe whilst searching for a cake for a Valentine's day party. I made a test run today to see how it would taste. Unfortunately all 3 layers had some dipping/falling in the centers which I usually do not get with any of the other cakes I make on a regular basis. Can you suggest anything which would prevent this please? Thank you!
Hi Kitty, I'm sorry that you had this issue! I'm not sure what could have caused it unless they needed a few more minutes in the oven? I would double check also that your flour is all purpose rather than self rising.
Thank you for the reply. Yes, 'tis a mystery! The flour is AP, I left them in a few minutes longer and the toothpick came out clean. When I cut the cake it was done in the middle. I was reading up on this malady of cake bakers and a couple of things mentioned, which I've made note of, had to do with beating the batter too long and too much leavening. I will do another test cake again tomorrow, if all goes well, I'll be making it on Monday.
*I did make the whipped cream filling and the buttercream, assembled the cake and took it to a friend's home who was having company. They devoured it and proclaimed it truly sinful! They never even knew about the sinking middles! :)
Great, I'm glad that you could put the test run to good use! I'm sure your friend is happy to be a taste tester for you! ;0) Hope it behaves for you next time!
Hi! OK, this might be a silly question, but can I replace the champagne with plain water? I know you have another doctored strawberry cake, but I prefer the extra batter this one makes. With the additional flour and sugar you get more cake! Also, will the cake list go back to being in alphabetical order? LOL, sorry...It just made finding cakes easier. Thank you, thank you as always!!
Hi Agnes! I think that it should work with water as well- if you try it, let us know how it goes! I agree, I'd like to get the alphabetical order back also. The listing order changed automatically with some technical updates that were made- we'll see what we can do! :0)
hi,
the raspberry champagne mascarpone cake is delicious, and would like yo use the reçipe to make 200 cupcakes. can i freeze them andcwhat is the procedure. how would i defrost them to ice them and when before i require them. many thanks.