This is one of my most favourite cakes that I have made to date. I’ve seen dozens of different versions of this prior to making it, so I wanted to make sure that I put my own spin on the outside of the cake in order to set it apart from the others! To do this, I used the “petal” technique and I hope you love it as much as I do!
Rainbow Cake
This is a large 8 inch (20 centimeter) round and 8 inch (20 centimeter) high cake. It will serve around 16-20 people.
Ingredients:
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2 batches vanilla cake
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2-3 batches of vanilla buttercream
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Gel Paste: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple
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Six 12 inch piping bags
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large round tip (Ateco 809 or Wilton 1A or equivalent)
Procedure:
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Preheat your oven to 350˚F/180˚C. Grease and prepare six 8 inch (20 centimeter) cake pans.
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Prepare the vanilla cake batter. Divide the batter into 6 bowls, and colour each one a separate colour using ¼- ½ teaspoon (1-3 milliliters) of gel paste for each colour.
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Bake each coloured cake in the oven for 15-20 minutes and allow to cool completely before levelling.
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Prepare the buttercream. Leave some of it white for the layers between the cakes, approximately 2-3 cups (240 milliliters- 720 milliliters) and divide the remaining buttercream into 6 bowls, and colour each separately.
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The order of colours from bottom to top goes purple, blue, green, yellow, orange, red. Starting with the base of the cake, place the purple cake layer onto a plate or cake board and use a swipe of buttercream to “glue” the cake to the base. Add white buttercream on top of the cake layer using a metal spatula and smooth it out evenly.
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On top of the buttercream layer, place the blue cake layer, top with white buttercream and smooth. Repeat, alternating between cake layers and buttercream until the final red layer is at the top. Once you reach the top of the cake, cover the entire cake in white buttercream. Ensure that the cake is straight up and down (not leaning), and place into freezer to solidify the layers of buttercream. This will make it easier to decorate without causing the cake to lean.
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Petal technique: Place purple buttercream in a piping bag fitted with a large round tip, such as Ateco 806, or Wilton 1A. To make the petal shape, place the tip about an ⅛ inch (½ centimeter) away from the side of the cake, squeeze the piping bag, allow the buttercream to “grow” into a mound, and then pull the bag away from the mound, along the side of the cake, slowly stop squeezing the further away from the mound you get. Line the tip up again where you left off, and repeat the process. I started at the base of the cake with the purple buttercream, went around the cake entirely, and then moved up to blue, then green, yellow, orange, and finally red. Repeat as many times as necessary to cover the entire cake. The same technique is used to cover the top as well.
- Slice and serve immediately. The cake can be kept in a sealed container in the fridge for 2-3 days.
The dirty dishes are worth it for this beautiful cake!
I had my daughters 5th birthday last night and this cake was the biggest hit! Everyone was amazed that I actually made this cake! Thank you Jenn for your wonderful directions and ideas. One suggestion is to update the buttercream tutorial video on YouTube. I found out the hard way that the recipe on your website is the correct one and not in the video. Thank you again for helping make my daughters birthday so special.
Hi Jenn. I was wondering how many batches of the new vanilla buttercream you would need to make the rainbow cake. I want to make this cake and I need to know how many batches of the vanilla buttercream you need
Hey can you please tell me the amount of cake batter and cream cheese frosting that you have used for this gorgeous rainbow cake .
It says at least 1.5 batches of vanilla cake recipe, her recipe you can find it on this same blog!
I realize this is an older post, but can you tell me the names of the colors that you used? I’m making a cake, and would like the colors to be the same shade as the colors in this cake. More specifically the green, red, purple, orange, and blue.
I use americolor gel pastes and I used whatever colors came in the 12 pack 🙂
Hi! Just wanted to know how early in advance can you make this cake…working the usual 9-5er and needed for a saturday morning party. Thought of doing it in stages over 3nightsto ease the pressure..what is your advice?
You can freeze the cake layers for 1-2 months, so you can have those made well ahead of time. Wrap each layer individually in plastic wrap and make sure they’re completely cooled before wrapping. You can make the buttercream the day before you want to use it, and the day you bring it out of the fridge, let it come to room temperature before trying to ice with it as it will be rock hard. The cake is best if completed the night before, or day of. Good luck!
What brand of food coloring do you use fo such bright colors?
I use Americolor gel paste usually.
Can you please provide the names of the colours you used?
Thanks
You can get americolor at Kake Kreattions. Its in Sherman way
Thk you Sofia and where is that. ?