21 Easy Cake Recipes

January 15, 2019
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Even beginning bakers can master these easy cake recipes. Start with a box of cake mix or a few simple ingredients to make a cake that's impressive, but won't take up your whole day. 
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Chocolate Tiramisu Poke Cake

Photo: Daniel Agee
Chocolate Tiramisu Poke Cake Recipe

The poke cake technique is incredibly easy, but that doesn't mean that poke cakes have a simple flavor. Enjoy the irresistible textures of pudding, cake, and crushed espresso beans in each bite of with this chocoatey take on Tiramisu.

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Carrot-Walnut-Coconut Sheet Cake

Photo: Kelsey Hansen; Food Styling: Karen Rankin; Prop Styling: Audrey Davis
Carrot-Walnut-Coconut Sheet Cake Recipe

This moist, delicious carrot cake has traditional ingredients like carrot, pineapple, and walnuts, with the addition of toasted coconut flakes to dress up cream cheese icing.

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Tiramisu Cake

Time Inc. Video Studios
Tiramisu Cake Recipe

Everything you love about classic Italian tiramisu, layered into an impressive cake. 

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Watercolor Cake

Time Inc. Video Studio
Watercolor Cake Recipe

This stunning watercolor effect is a surprisingly simple cake decorating technique that makes for an incredibly special dessert. 

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Zodiac Cake

Photo: Daniel Agee; Food Styling: Paige Grandjean
Zodiac Cake Recipe

Create this stellar constellation-inspired Zodiac Cake using boxed cake mix, and just a little craftiness. The colorful astrological layer cake is fun to assemble and decorate, and would make for an awesome birthday centerpiece. 

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Basic Naked Cake

Photo: Emma Crist; Styling: Emma Crist
Basic Naked Cake Recipe

Instead of completely coating the entire cake, this unique cake decorating technique spreads the frosting thin enough to leave the layers exposed--i.e. 'naked.' If you added too much frosting at first, firmly scrape excess frosting away while smoothing it out at the same time using a metal bench scraper or offset spatula. Pro tip: Used boxed cake mix to make this recipe even easier. All-purpose flour and a handful of pantry-staple ingredient makes this ultra-fluffy batter even easier.

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One-Pot Chocolate Cake

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One-Pot Chocolate Cake Recipe

This delicious chocolate cake from our friend Joy the Baker comes together in one sauce pan, so you can enjoy the rich flavor and whipped topping without the worry of cleaning too many dishes afterwards!

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Confetti Flower Cake

Photo: Whitney Ott; Food Styling: Mary-Claire Britton; Prop Styling: Audrey Davis
Confetti Flower Cake Recipe

 

It may be hard to believe that this stunning layer cake could taste as delightful as it looks, but trust us on this one… it’s well worth cutting into. We create an all-natural “fun-fetti” look for this Confetti Flower Cake with edible flower petals flecked throughout the moist and delicate vanilla layers. Covered in a light, fluffy strawberry frosting (and a few more garnishing edible flowers for good measure), this wow-worthy confetti cake is the perfect centerpiece for your next special occasion—be it a birthday party or a wedding shower.

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Easter Candy Snack Cake 

Photo: Gina DeSimone; Prop Styling: Kashara Johnson; Food Styling: Emily Nabors Hall
Easter Candy Snack Cake  Recipe

Dotted with pastel Easter candies and drizzled with white chocolate, this easy snack cake is the perfect, simple treat to whip up for an Easter celebration. In fact, the buttery dessert caught our test kitchen crew completely off-guard; it may appear “cute” and unassuming, but rest assured, this snack cake is no joke in terms of being addictively delicious. It’s not a cake you’ll be able to have “just a little piece” of. 

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Apple Bundt Cake with Apple-Cream Cheese Glaze 

Darcy Lenz
Apple Bundt Cake with Apple-Cream Cheese Glaze  Recipe

This incredibly moist bundt cake gains its strong apple flavor from 4 cups of shredded Granny smith apples baked into the batter, as well as a concentrated apple liquid (made by reducing apple juice and apple liqueur) that is brushed over the warm cake after baking and used to create the cake’s sweet-tart apple and cream cheese glaze. Grating the apples, as opposed to chopping them into pieces, makes for more even distribution of moisture and apple flavor throughout this dense and delightful cake. While we opted to keep the spice factor simple here (to avoid overpowering the apple) with just a teaspoon of cinnamon, feel free to mix it up and add other favorite spices—such as cloves, ginger, nutmeg, or allspice. You can also swap the vanilla bean paste for 11/2 teaspoons of pure vanilla extract. If you can’t find apple liqueur, simply substitute apple flavored brandy or 1/4 cup more apple juice. 

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Tahini-Blueberry Sheet Cake With Strawberry Buttercream

Photo: Aaron Kirk; Prop Styling: Kashara Johnson; Food Styling: Pam Lolley
Tahini-Blueberry Sheet Cake With Strawberry Buttercream Recipe

Perfect for a graduation party or summer cookout, this impressive dessert offers the ease and crowd-friendly factor that we associate with a sheet cake, as well as a delightful twist of creativity and surprising vibrancy with the incorporation of tahini and fresh berries. If you have a jar of the trendy sesame seed paste hanging out in your pantry, trust us—it’s high time to go beyond hummus and welcome it into your dessert life. Tahini lends a delicious toasty quality to the tender cake while fresh blueberries dotted throughout the batter balance this nutty depth with their bright, juicy sweetness. A simple strawberry buttercream ties everything together and makes for a low-effort, eye-catching presentation. 

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Better Than Sex Cake

Photo: Beth Branch
Better Than Sex Cake Recipe

Chocolate, caramel, and Heath candy take chocolate cake to a whole new level.

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Skittles Rainbow Cake

Time Inc. Video Studio 
Skittles Rainbow Cake Recipe

Cake the rainbow.

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Lemon-Olive Oil Cake with Whipped Mascarpone

Photographer: Hector Manuel Sanchez; Prop Styling: Lauren Smith Ford; Food Styling: Tina Bell Stamos 
Lemon-Olive Oil Cake with Whipped Mascarpone Recipe

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Fresh Strawberry Sheet Cake

Time Inc. Video Studio
Fresh Strawberry Sheet Cake Recipe

This simple, fresh strawberry cake is the perfect springtime dessert. Besides being wonderfully easy to slice and serve for a crowd, sheet cakes (like this pink beauty) are great for entertaining because they require no special cake frosting skills to look impressive. 

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Margarita Cake

Time Inc. Video Studio
Margarita Cake Recipe

It’s everyone’s favorite refreshing tequila cocktail… in cake form. Truly, what could be better? With tart lime curd and tequila syrup, this festive show-stopper cake does justice to the flavors of an authentic margarita. 

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Sweet Potato Dump Cake

Time Inc. Video Studios
Sweet Potato Dump Cake Recipe

All the fall flavors you could possibly want in one simple dessert.

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Birthday Cake

Photo: Aaron Kirk; Prop Stylist: Sarah Elizabeth Cleveland; Food Styling: Sarah Epperson
Birthday Cake Recipe

For a festive occasion, few treats can match the celebratory spirit of a classic birthday cake—and this easy-to-follow formula is the only one you’ll ever need. Our birthday cake recipe yields two dense layers of buttery, vanilla-forward white cake wrapped in classically rich buttercream frosting. For the signature, picture perfect birthday cake look, don’t forget to garnish your frosted cake with rainbow sprinkles. You can also stir a handful of colored sprinkles right into the cake batter  to create a funfetti effect.

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Blueberry-Peach Upside Down Cake

Photo: Aaron Kirk; Prop Styling: Sarah Elizabeth Cleveland; Food Styling: Julia Levy
Blueberry-Peach Upside Down Cake Recipe

This stunning upside-down cake is the perfect, easy dessert to showcase your bounty of summer fruit. The cake is tender and moist, with just enough of a delightful toothy texture from the incorporation of cornmeal into the batter. You’ll want to use juicy, ripe blueberries and peaches for best results; however, you could use frozen fruit in a pinch—just be sure to thaw and dry throughly. A few more tips to ensure upside-down cake success: Finish incorporating the ingredients by hand, this will prevent over-mixing your way to a tough cake. Also, aim to arrange the fruit as tightly as you can in the cake pan; fruit shrinks as it cooks and you don’t want too much unadorned cake poking through. Finally, if you want to skip the cornmeal, simply swap it 1:1 with all-purpose flour (for a total of 1 1/3 cups). 

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Marble Sheet Cake

Photo: Jennifer Davick; Styling: Mindi Shapiro Levine
Marble Sheet Cake Recipe
Swirl chocolate and yellow cake batter together in this marble sheetcake recipe and top with a rich mocha frosting.

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