Golden Vanilla Cake 9×13″ with Old Fashioned Vanilla Frosting made without powdered sugar.
Happy New Year! I hope everyone has a blessed year in 2020! I’m so excited to finally share my favorite vanilla cake recipe with you! I think this is the best vanilla cake recipe although I have a couple that come in at seconded place. This cake is moist and not too dense. I baked it in a 9×13″ glass Pyrex baking pan.
This cake will also make about 24 cupcakes if you don’t want to bake a cake.
The frosting recipe is an old fashioned vanilla frosting recipe that uses regular granulated sugar and not powdered sugar. The frosting is not as sweet as powdered sugar buttercream frosting and has a slightly grainy texture to it but I love it and it comes in handy if you are out of powdered sugar. You can top the cake with whatever type of frosting you prefer. I’m just sharing with you an old fashioned non powdered sugar recipe that is shown in the first photo. I make this cake recipe all the time but I never take a photo of it but we just celebrated a birthday and I finally remembered to snap a photo of it!
- -Cake-
- 1¾ cups all-purpose flour
- 1½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ cup salted butter, softened
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- ¼ cup soybean oil or vegetable oil
- ⅓ cup sour cream
- 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- ⅔ cup milk (I used 2%)
- -Frosting-
- ½ cup milk
- 2 tablespoons flour
- pinch of salt
- ¾ cup sugar (plus up to a ½ cup extra if you want it thicker)
- ½ cup (1 stick) salted butter, softened
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x13" baking pan.
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, & baking soda (add ⅛ teaspoon salt if using unsalted butter) & mix together.
- In another bowl cream sugar & butter together with electric mixer until light & fluffy.
- Add the creamed butter & sugar to the flour mixture & mix on medium-low speed for about a minute, you will end up with a crumb texture.
- Add eggs, oil, sour cream, & vanilla to the flour mixture & beat on medium speed until just combined.
- Slowly add in the milk on low speed until just combined.
- Pour batter into 9x13" baking dish. Bake for 20-26 minutes. Insert toothpick in center of a cake until it comes out clean or you can gently tap the top with your finger, if it springs back its done.
- Remove from oven & let cool in pan.
- For the Frosting:
- Whisk milk, flour, and salt together in a saucepan over medium-low heat. Keep stirring until the mixture gets very thick and bubbly.
- Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
- In a mixing bowl using an electric mixer beat sugar and butter together until smooth and creamy. Beat in the cooled flour mixture until it is light and fluffy. Beat in the vanilla. Add up to ½ cup extra sugar if you want it thicker. I usually add extra sugar.
- Frost cooled cake.
Hi I’m Jean thanks for good recipes I have done my icing came out perfectly
Hi Jean, I’m glad the recipe turned out for you. Thank you for taking the time to comment, we appreciate it.
Do you have nutritional info?
Hi Char, I don’t but I think there are websites you can find on google that allow you to copy and paste recipes in to check the nutritional info. Thanks!
i was very very wrong, sorry I overreacted to my bad cooking. it tasted great.please ignore my previous comment.
Hi Alex, Hope all turned out well with the cake. Thanks for taking the time to comment, we appreciate it.
Hi Holly and Katie, How do you make frosting without powdered sugar and not cooked. I saw your sugar recipe for frosting! But my mom used to make one that Sanders (Detroit) ice cream used on their cakes. There’s was super fine sugar and no cook. She passed on and I never got the recipe. Do you know anything about old recipes for frosting that were just mixed together and not cooked, but using granulated or super fine sugar?
Hi Kathy, I’m not sure about an uncooked frosting recipe using regular sugar. The only part that is cooked is the flour and milk to make a paste so it has a better texture and thickens up. It could be made with just milk, sugar, vanilla, and butter but it might be liquidy. I have not tried it. Thanks.
Can I put this in a round cake pan? Or two? ?
Hi Britt, It can be baked in 2 round cake pans.
How much salt is needed for the cake part? It says a pinch of salt for frosting…but i don’t see how much for cake part?
Hi, No salt is added to the cake. It is not needed if you are using salted butter as it calls for. Thanks.
This is literally the BEST cake recipe I have ever made. And I have tried many recipes.
So glad you liked it. Thanks for taking the time to comment, we appreciate it.
I made the frosting as per directions and found that it came out gritty. Did I do something wrong?
No, if you read the paragraph I wrote above it notes that the texture is grainy. Regular sugar is not super fine like powdered sugar so it is normal for it to stay a grainy texture. Thanks.