WASC Cake (Cake Mix)
This easy White Almond Sour Cream Cake is so popular that it has long been referred to by its abbreviation, WASC, in the cake world.
It is a moist and flavorful layer cake recipe that is versatile enough for cupcakes, and sturdy enough to handle light carving or being covered with fondant.
WASC cake is a great example of a tried and true cake mix recipe that would please any crowd. Keep it in mind as a birthday cake, bridal shower cake, baby shower cake, and more!
Table of Contents
Why we Love WASC Cake
- It goes with just about any filling and frosting that you can think of, and you can easily change it up with add-ins and extracts to make it your own or create new variations.
- Super easy to make
- Has a from-scratch texture thanks to the sour cream in the recipe
- Is a great "base cake recipe" which can easily be transformed with add-ins and extracts.
How to Make WASC Cake
You can find the full, printable cake recipe further down in this post. Here is a quick rundown of the steps!
- Preheat: Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.
- Prepare the Cake Pans: Grease and flour two 8x2 round cake pans. (You could also divide the batter between three 8 inch cake layers if you would rather have an additional layer of filling).
- Dry ingredients: In the bowl of your mixer, combine dry ingredients and whisk at least 30 seconds to blend.
- Wet Ingredients: In another bowl, combine sour cream, water, vegetable oil, eggs, vanilla extract, and almond extract.
- Combine: Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix on medium speed for 2 minutes. Stop after 1 minute to scrape the sides and bottom of bowl then continue to beat for the second minute.
- Pour into Pans and Bake: Pour into prepared cake pans and bake at 325 degrees....check at 35 minutes to see if middle of cake springs back when touched, a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake come out clean or with just a few crumbs attached, and the cake will be slightly pulled away from the pan.
Decorating the WASC Cake
The cake in our photo was frosted with our Classic Vanilla Buttercream. We used the beautiful piped buttercream technique which we teach in our free video tutorial for Cascading Rosettes of Buttercream!
There are infinite ways that this cake could be decorated, whether with a smooth finish, textured, or piped. If you are interested in cake decorating, please make sure to check out our collection of hundreds of free Cake Decorating Videos!
Recipe FAQs
More Doctored Cake Mix Recipes
We've made many doctored cake mix recipes over the years! These cakes are super moist, have wonderful flavor, and they taste like they were made from scratch.
Each of these cake mix recipes have been enhanced with additional ingredients to make them unique. Some have sour cream, some have instant pudding, fruit puree, jello, and more. There are so many creative ways to doctor up a simple cake mix!
Some of our favorites are our Easy Lemon Cake from cake mix, Easy Strawberry Cake, German Chocolate Cake from Cake Mix, and Italian Cream Bundt Cake!
Have you made this? We would LOVE for you to leave a ⭐️ rating as well as a comment and photo below! We really appreciate your feedback!
WASC Cake (White Almond Sour Cream)
Ingredients
- 1 box white cake mix, sifted (15.25 oz) (we use cake mix without pudding in the mix) This recipe will work for yellow cake mix as well.
- 1 cup all purpose flour (121g)
- 1 cup granulated sugar (200g)
- generous dash of salt
- 1 cup sour cream or plain yogurt (greek yogurt is fine also) (242g)
- ¼ Cup Canola Oil (54g)
- 1 cup water (240g)
- 3 whole eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla (8g)
- ½ teaspoon almond extract (If you don't want almond, you can substitute additional vanilla) (2g)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.
- Grease and flour two 8x2 round cake pans. (You could also divide the batter between three 8 inch cake layers if you would rather have an additional layer of filling).
- In the bowl of your mixer, combine dry ingredients and whisk at least 30 seconds to blend.
- In another bowl, combine sour cream, water, oil, eggs, & flavorings. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix on medium speed for 2 minutes. Stop after 1 minute to scrape the sides and bottom of bowl then continue to beat for the second minute.
- Pour into prepared pans and bake at 325 degrees....check at 35 minutes to see if middle of cake springs back when touched, a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake come out clean or with just a few crumbs attached, and the cake will be slightly pulled away from the pan.
- We bake at 325 degrees to decrease the height of the dome on the cakes.
- Makes about 7 cups of batter.
Hi Be Be! When I used 1 cup of sugar I was told that with the sugar in the frosting, it was a bit too sweet. I reduced the sugar to 1/2 cup and the cake was loved by all..
First - I LOVE THIS RECIPE! I use it as my go t0 for almost everything, then I adapt flavors as necessary (lemon, almond, chai, etc...). So here's a new one: I am working on a menu for a French Tea Party. Do you think I could use this recipe and adapt it for rose water, or lavender cakes instead? Or would it be better to just make recipes for those separately. Any thoughts?
Hi, I love this recipe I've been using it for a long time, I have a question has anyone made this cake using vegetable oil instead of sour cream? Does it have the same consistency and flavor? Is it moist too? Thank you I'm just trying not to use animal products, I know it has eggs too :( but taking out the cream is a start, thank you so much :)
Sorry one more question, can I leave out any of the sugar to make it a little less sweet? and if I do should I substitute it with more water or something else? Because I've heard that the sugar helps it to be moist, thanks again
Omg I just made this and wow I'm in love the flavor is yummy must quit tasting it lol
I'm sorry that we've missed a couple of questions! Not sure how they snuck by us! -
@KaysCupcakes- So glad that you like the recipe! Did you try adapting to rosewater or lavender? Sounds nice! It seems that you could research recommended recipes for these cake flavors to get an idea of flavoring amounts. For instance, here's one that I found on Taste of Home that calls for 1 tbsp lavender--http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/almond-lavender-cake
Good luck!
@Cinthia- I would probably just opt for another recipe that doesn't call for sour cream. Also, you can adjust the amount of sugar-- Joan Humes in a comment above said that she liked the recipe with a 1/2 cup sugar. Good luck as you experiment! ;0)
@Trina-- So glad that you like the recipe!
could you substitute plain greek yogurt for the sour cream???
Has anyone else had issues with cake falling in the middle with this recipe?
I have baked several cake for the last 2 weeks with this recipe and all are completely sinking in the middle and will not rise! So frustrating. Luckily both cakes have a cream cheese filling so I'm looking at the positive and using the crater in the middle as a well. Just wondering if perhaps I need to adding some baking powder/soda? Could it be my location causing the problem? Cupcakes do fine, but cakes won't rise in center. Any advice would be appreciated!
Hi Tara, My first thought is that your cakes could be falling in the center because your oven is not heating properly. I would buy an oven thermometer to check for accuracy. They are sold at Bed Bath and Beyond, probably Target also.
Another thought.....are you using cake pans that are deeper than usual? If so, you would need to use a rose nail to even out the heating and bake a bit longer.
I have used this recipe several times and have had some issues when baking in my 3 inch pans. I notice if I put the batter in my 2 inch pans, the cake comes out beautifully, but if I use my 3 inch pans the cake makes these bubbly looking things on top and it falls towards the end of baking. When I go to level, the cakes look like they aren't cooked fully in the middle. It's so weird. Even the outer parts looked uncooked. My question is, can the temp be adjusted for 3 inch pans or do I need to stick to using 2 inch pans?
Hi Jennifer, When baking in 3 inch deep pans, fill only 1/2 full. I think that will solve the problem.
Hello Melissa and BeBe,
I tried this recipe for the first time and I have a few questions if you don't mind, please.
I found the bare cake a little too sweet, but then realized I had forgotten to add the salt. Maybe next time this would solve the problem, but should I decrease the granulated sugar?
I made some cupcakes and the cake stuck to the wrapper. The sides of the cupcake tasted like and had the consistency of angel food cake. Why did it stick to the cupcake wrapper?
I've always wanted to ask this question: Should I be particular about the type and brand of vanilla extract that I use. Does it really make a difference if I bought vanilla bean paste, Madagascar vanilla, or Wilton vanilla extract?