Strawberry Cake. No artificial colour or flavour added!

Strawberry Cake. There is no artificial colouring or flavouring used to get the beautiful pink hues in this delicious, made from scratch, strawberry cake.

Strawberry Cake no artificial colour or flavour

There are a lot of recipes out there for brightly coloured, pink strawberry cakes. To be honest, I haven’t liked many of them.

When you search around on the web for Strawberry Cake, or see beautiful examples on Pinterest, I’m very often disappointed. I find that they are mostly flavoured and coloured by adding strawberry jelly powder and/or food colouring to the recipe.

So many people have a sensitivity to food colourings, especially those in the red spectrum. I wanted to try to come up with a pretty pink cake recipe to share in time for Mother’s Day in about a week’s time.

I will not say that I was immediately successful in my attempts at a strawberry cake. One of them was so heavy and dense that it went straight into the garbage bin.

Strawberry Cake no artificial colour or flavour

Strawberry Cake. Getting the flavour right.

I tried using straight strawberry puree which did not colour or flavour the cake enough. What was necessary was to concentrate both the colour and the flavour of the strawberries before I added it to the cake batter and the frosting.

I decided to make a slowly simmered and greatly reduced simple strawberry jam for this purpose. When pureed, it worked very well in both the cake and the frosting.

I think the strawberry frosting is pretty essential to this cake. It really does help to carry that authentic strawberry flavour.

Concentrated strawberry puree.

To get the best colour possible, I actually did leave the strawberries out on the counter for a few days to get as ripe as possible. I let their colour darken, without leaving them there long enough to go bad.

Plan a Strawberry Cake this summer.

When strawberries are in season we get them at Lester’s Farm U-Pick, here in St. John’s. When they are next in season, I think I’ll pick a basket of them specifically to make this cake.

You know, the one’s that get left behind and are a deep dark red. They would be perfect.

You can have this strawberry cake at your Mother’s Day celebration or as a birthday cake for a special kid in your life. You know one who loves pink, I am sure.

It’s great knowing that you can achieve great flavour and colour by completely natural means.

2018 Winter update: I recently made this cake using some frozen strawberries that I bought at Costco. I’ve been told that many of the whole frozen strawberries that we buy are actually riper than the fresh ones that go to market.

It’s easy & economical to make your own puree using frozen berries too.

That kind of makes sense to me because obviously they would have a much shorter shelf life in the fresh market. Better to flash freeze them and sell them that way.

This also means that they have a deeper colour which I found worked well with this recipe.

Lone story short, don’t hesitate to use frozen strawberries at any time. You’ll still have a delicious cake in the end.

Strawberry Cake no artificial colour or flavour

Love homemade cakes from scratch?

We’ve put together a collection of the 25 Most Baked Cakes of the last 12 years on Rock Recipes. You are sure to find several to love.

Like this Strawberry Cake recipe?

You’ll find hundreds of other sweet ideas in our Cakes & Pies Category and even more in our Desserts Category.

It’s easy to keep up with the latest home style cooking & baking ideas from Rock Recipes. Be sure to follow Rock Recipes Facebook Page and follow us on Instagram. 

Plus you’ll see daily recipe suggestions from decadent desserts to quick delicious weekday meals too.

You can also sign up for our FREE newsletter to know immediately when we add new recipes. You’ll also get weekly suggestions for great family friendly  meals and desserts too!

Continue to Content

Yield: 16 servings

Strawberry Cake - no artificial colour or flavour added!

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 40 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 10 minutes

Strawberry Cake - there is no artificial colouring or flavouring used to get the beautiful pink hues in this delicious, made from scratch, strawberry cake.

Print

Ingredients

For the strawberry jam puree

• 3 cups very ripe sliced strawberries
• 1/2 cup sugar

For the cake batter

• 3/4 cup butter
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 eggs
• 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup cake flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 1/4 cups whipping cream
• 3/4 cup strawberry jam puree

For the Strawberry Frosting

• 6 cups icing sugar, powdered sugar
• 1 cup room temperature butter
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup strawberry jam puree
• a little milk, if necessary

Instructions

To prepare the strawberry jam puree

1. You will need to prepare this puree in advance so that it has time to cool before being added to the cake batter.
2. In a small saucepan combine the strawberries and sugar and bring them to a gentle simmer.
3. Continue to simmer stirring occasionally for a half hour or so until the volume of the berries has reduced by at least half.
4. Allow the berries to cool before pureeing with an immersion blender or with a few pulses in a standard counter top blender. You will need a total of 1 1/4 cups of this puree for to make both the cake and the frosting. Any excess can be stored in a covered container and used as jam for your morning toast.

To prepare the cake batter.

1. Grease and flour two 8 or 9 inch cake pans. Line the bottoms with circles of parchment paper for easy release later. (You can also bake this cake in a large bundt pan which has been generously greased and then floured. The bundt pan may take extra time, just let the toothpick test be your guide.)
2. Cream together the butter, sugar and vanilla extract until light and fluffy.
3. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
4. Sift together the all purpose flour, the cake flour, the baking powder and baking soda.
5. Mix the strawberry puree with the whipping cream.
6. Add the flour mixture to the creamed butter mixture alternately with the cream and strawberry puree mixture. folding well after each addition.
7. Always begin and end with the dry ingredients. As a general rule add the dry ingredients in 3 equal portions and the liquid ingredients in 2 equal portions.
8. Bake at 325 degrees F for 40-45 minutes or until wooden toothpick comes out clean.
9. Let the cakes rest in the pans for 5-10 minutes before turning them out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

To prepare the frosting

1. Cream together the butter with half of the icing sugar, then add the strawberry puree a couple of tablespoons at a time, alternately with some of the remaining icing sugar. Beat until smooth and spreadable.
2. The moisture content in the strawberry puree will probably vary from batch to batch so you may need a little more icing sugar if the frosting is too soft or add a tablespoon or two of milk if it is too thick. You want a nice soft, spreadable consistency.
3. Frost the cake with the finished icing and garnish with fresh strawberries.

Notes

Prep time does not include the additional time for the jam puree to cool.

If you want to bake this in a bundt pan follow the instructions given. If you want to poor a chocolate ganache glaze over the cake, just heat 1/4 cup of whipping cream in the microwave for a few seconds to get it slightly warm then add it to 1 cup of dark chocolate chips in a double boiler until the chocolate is smooth.

Recommended Products

Rock Recipes a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. Our product recommendations are almost exclusively for those we currently use or have used in the past.

• 
  Nordic Ware 9" Round Natural Aluminum Cake Pans, 2 Pack 9" Non-Stick
• 
  Silicone Spatula Set
• 
  Measuring Spoons: U-Taste 18/8 Stainless Steel Measuring Spoons Set of-7 Piece: 1/8 tsp, 1/4 tsp, 1/2 tsp, 3/4 tsp, 1 tsp, 1/2 tbsp & 1 tbsp Dry and Liquid Ingredients

Nutrition Information

Yield

16

Serving Size

slice
Amount Per Serving Calories 626Saturated Fat 17gCholesterol 110mgSodium 238mgCarbohydrates 95gFiber 2gSugar 74gProtein 4g

The nutritional information provided is automatically calculated by third party software and is meant as a guideline only. Exact accuracy is not guaranteed. For recipes where all ingredients may not be used entirely, such as those with coatings on meats, or with sauces or dressings for example, calorie & nutritional values per serving will likely be somewhat lower than indicated.

Did you like this recipe?

Do you love our "Real food recipes for real people'? Share the recipe on Facebook to let your friends know about us. They'll thank you for it.