The best strawberries are fresh strawberries straight from the orchard! We wanted to go out and pick our own but the orchard didn’t have that ready yet 🙁 It was okay though because we were able to pick up 2 apple cider jugs and a lovely basket of fresh picked strawberries, and just in time for Father’s Day! My boyfriend’s dad loves tart sweets, ergo the decision to make him a Strawberry Lemonade Layer Cake.
This 3 layer cake wasn’t too tall and had a really delicious frosting that we kept eating as we were making the cake…this was us: ? Not only are there strawberry slices in between the layers of the cake, there are also pureed strawberries in the buttercream frosting. Hooray! The recipe was pretty simple and it was a take on Buzzfeed’s popular version found here. I switched out the sugar for cane sugar and instead of whipped cream+jam for the icing, we did the pureed strawberries+butter+icing sugar.
While the unrefined cane sugar is less processed and retains many of good nutrients from cane juice, realistically all sugar should be had in moderation! Ergo, share the cake around so you’re not the only one eating this bad boy! (I love cake so I am lucky I live with so many people, so the cake gets split up pretty quickly.)
We had to play around with the cake because I hadn’t made a cake in a while, and in my rush, didn’t let the cake set/cool as long as it should 🙁 so the middle cake layer kind of collapsed a bit. We set the cake on a lazy susan in order to put it together and also cut out a circular piece of cardboard and covered it with aluminum foil. This gave a sturdy base for us to move the cake around and also to do the frosting on.
Don’t do what I did haha, and actually let your cake cool. We had a ton of fun anyways so here’s what you can take from this as well: cake is cake is cake and there are ways to fix how it looks (we fixed it with frosting) but really people will love the taste so it doesn’t have to be perfect. We sure did!!
Without further ado, here’s the recipe for this awesome cake! Our family really loved it and I hope you will too!
Fiona
Strawberry Lemonade Layer Cake with Olive Oil
Slightly tart frosting covers this immensely delicious cake with fresh strawberries & lemon. Fresh strawberries, luscious buttercream and a hint of lemonade hidden within!
Ingredients
- cooking spray
- 4 large eggs room temp
- 1½ cup cane sugar
- 1 cup olive oil
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ lemon juice 2 lemons freshly squeezed or from bottle
- 1 tbsp lemon zest
- 1 cup whole milk
- 2¼ cups all purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp sea salt/salt
- 1 basket fresh strawberries
- 1 lemon
Strawberry Frosting
- 1 cup softened butter room temp
- 2½ cups icing sugar approx
- ½ cup pureed strawberries about 1 cup fresh strawberries to make ¼ cup puree
Instructions
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Heat oven to 350F. Grease your three 8" cake tins with cooking spray, then cut out parchment paper in rounds to cover the bottom of the pans. Slice up the lemon and strawberries and put to the side.
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In a large bowl combine the eggs and cane sugar. I used a hand mixer to beat until it was 3x the volume. The mix should be thick!
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As you blend, slowly pour in the olive oil and once that is combined, add the vanilla extract, lemon zest, lemon juice, and whole milk. When this is smooth, sift in the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt). Using a spatula to gently combine them into the liquid. Make sure you do not over mix, otherwise - the cake will turn out rubbery.
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Evenly divide the batter into the three cake pans and bake for 20-25 minutes, until cakes are lightly golden and fork comes out clean from the center. I found that my cake that was in the bottom rack did not cook as well as the top two so I would switch racks about halfway through.
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Leave the cakes to cool into the pans for 10 minutes before transferring to a baking rack to cool entirely.
Strawberry Buttercream
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Using a stand mixer with the whisk attachment or a hand mixer, place the softened butter in first and whip until smooth, then add the icing sugar. Add the pureed strawberries, which should allow the frosting to become even smoother. If adding the puree causes the frosting to be too runny, add a bit of icing sugar back into the blend until it's at the best consistency for spreading. Keep in mind that the ingredients used in this frosting is a double batch and there should be some frosting leftover! 🙂 We used probably 1½ of the batch.
Putting It Together
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Place the first cooled layer of cake onto the foil circle. Cover the top of the cake with a thick layer of frosting then place the sliced strawberries over the whole layer. Add the second layer and do the same. Add the third layer of cake and cover the whole top with frosting. If your cake is getting a little warm because of the weather (ie. it's summer), you can stick the whole cake in the freezer for 30-60 mins.
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Add a thin crumb coat. We wanted to make it a semi-naked cake so it's not a ton of frosting on the outside. Clean up the sides, then start piping around the base of the cake. I used a big circular piping nozzle to do mine but you can choose whichever style you prefer.
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Place slices of strawberry and lemon in a random way on the top to garnish. Honestly, it was kind of haphazard and my tip for you is to do things in uneven numbers. It's more appealing for the eye!
