Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

I love the deep red of Red Velvet Cake! It looks amazing with the white contrast of cream cheese icing or frosting. This recipe made a beautiful, soft and moist cake AND I didn't get food colouring anywhere. Trust me, that is a quite a feat. 

It was hard to find a recipe I was happy with, but I am so glad I used this one from Pinch My Salt (2008). 

2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 tbs cocoa powder
59ml (2oz) red food colouring
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk, room temperature
1 tsp white vinegar
1 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 180'C (350'F) and butter and flour 6 4" or 10cm cake tins that have the removable base. 

Sift together cake flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. In another bowl, mix food colouring and cocoa powder until there are no lumps. Set aside. In a large bowl, beat in eggs one at a time, then add vanilla and red cocoa mix. Add one third of flour mix to the butter mix and beat well, then beat in half the buttermilk. Beat in another third of the flour, then the second half of buttermilk. End with the flour mix and beat until well combined. 

In a small bowl, mix vinegar and baking soda. Quickly add it to the cake batter and combine. Divide the batter evenly between the cake tins. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until you can insert a skewer into the centre with it coming out clean. Cool the cakes on a wire rack.

Cream Cheese Frosting

2 packages of cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups icing sugar, sifted

Blend together cream cheese and butter until smooth. On a low speed blend the icing sugar and vanilla. Turn on high and beat until light and fluffy. 

Putting it together

Put the cakes in the freezer for 5 minutes to make them a bit harder. When cold, taken them out and carefully cut the top off so the cake is level. Place a nice dollop of the frosting on one of the cakes and place the other cake on top. I found the easiest way to frost the cakes was to do the crumb coating. Do a light icing coat on the cakes and let sit. This will pick up all the crumbs on the cake. Do another thicker layer of the frosting until you can't see the colour of the cake anymore.

Pinch My Salt. (2008). Red Velvet Cake. Retrieved from http://pinchmysalt.com/red-velvet-cake-recipe/