This vegan strawberry cake is a dream! Topped with strawberry buttercream frosting and decorated with fresh strawberries it’s a strawberry lovers dream come true!
The strawberry flavor comes through perfectly and comes from strawberry purée and a little strawberry essence.
This cake is also a reader request, so please continue to request things, we want to make all the things that you want to see!
The strawberry purée and strawberry essence give the batter a lovely light pink color, however I found that it didn’t hold when baking.
So I added in a tablespoon of pink food coloring. You can omit this if you don’t mind about the color, but as you can see the result was a nice shade of pink that (mostly) held through the baking process.
The strawberry frosting is also flavored with strawberry purée and a little strawberry extract.
By the way it might be called strawberry essence where you are, or it might be called strawberry flavoring, it’s the same thing and will do the job perfectly.
And then of course you’re going to decorate with fresh strawberries, it’s a strawberry cake after all!
But just beware that strawberries can run a little, so put them on right before serving.
So if you love strawberries, then you are going to simply LOVE this vegan strawberry cake, it is:
- Moist
- Fluffy
- Packed with strawberry flavor
- Pink
- Pretty!
- Topped with strawberry buttercream frosting!
Keep it covered at room temperature where it will stay fresh for a few days or covered in the fridge where it will stay good for up to a week.
What do you think of this vegan strawberry cake? Let us know in the comments! And please rate the recipe if you make it as this is so helpful!
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Vegan Strawberry Cake with Strawberry Frosting
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Prep Time: 20 mins - Cook Time: 30 mins
- Total Time: 50 minutes
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Yield: 10 -
Category: Dessert, Cakes -
Method: Bake -
Cuisine: Vegan
Print Recipe
Pin RecipeDescription
Light, fluffy and deliciously moist vegan strawberry cake with strawberry frosting. This pretty pink cake is packed with strawberry flavor and ideal for any kind of celebration!
Ingredients
For the Strawberry Cake:
- 2 cups (250g) + 3 Tbsp All Purpose Flour
- 1 cup (200g) White Sugar
- 1 tsp Baking Soda
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1 cup (232g) Strawberry Purée*
- 2 tsp Strawberry Extract
- 1/3 cup (80ml) Extra Virgin Olive Oil (or other vegetable oil)
- 1 Tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1 Flax Egg
- 1 Tbsp Pink or Red Food Coloring (Optional)
For the Strawberry Frosting:
- 4 cups (480g) Powdered (Confectioners) Sugar
- 1/4 cup (56g) Vegan Butter
- 1/4 cup (60ml) Strawberry Purée*
- 1 tsp Strawberry Extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).
- Sift the flour into a mixing bowl and add the sugar, baking soda and salt.
- Prepare your flax egg by mixing 1 Tbsp of ground flaxseed meal with 3 Tbsp of Hot Water from the kettle. Allow to sit for a minute to become gloopy.
- Add the strawberry purée, strawberry extract, olive oil, vinegar, flax egg and food coloring and mix in. The batter will be very thick, too thick to whisk, so just use a spoon and mix as well as you can, being careful not to over-mix.
- Spray two 7-inch cake tins with non-stick spray, and place a circle of parchment paper at the base of each. Divide the batter evenly between them and place into the oven to bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of one of the cakes comes out clean.
- Transfer to a wire cooling rack to cool completely before frosting.
- Prepare your frosting by adding the powdered sugar, vegan butter, strawberry purée and strawberry extract into the bowl of an electric mixer. Starting at slow speed, gradually increase speed until thick and smooth. The frosting should be very thick, but still spreadable. Add more powdered sugar if it’s too thin and a little more strawberry purée if it ends up too thick.
- Frost the cakes when cooled and serve with fresh strawberries.
Notes
*Make your own strawberry purée by placing fresh strawberries (washed, with stems cut off) into the food processor and processing into a purée. In order to get enough purée for both the cake recipe and the frosting I used a whole 14oz (400g) pack of fresh whole strawberries. There was a bit left over from puréeing this amount, so you can also use a bit less, or you can just eat the bit that’s left over.
*Weigh your flour for the most accurate results as flour measures are the most tricky in baking.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Slice (of 10)
- Calories: 435
- Sugar: 69g
- Sodium: 282mg
- Fat: 10.3g
- Saturated Fat: 1.5g
- Carbohydrates: 85g
- Fiber: 1.5g
- Protein: 2.2g
Keywords: vegan strawberry cake
A light fluffy pink delight!
★★★★★
Can it be made gluten free?
I would imagine so – if you check out my gluten-free chocolate cake I talk about the changes that have to happen for a cake to be gluten free. The same would apply here. 🙂
So can we just swap out the regular flour for gluten-free? Same amount?
Also, can you list the name of the strawberry flavoring/essence you use? Does the recipe require imitation strawberry extract, for example? I did find another brand called Preema strawberry concentrated food flavoring.
My daughter is turning 4 and wants a pink cake for her birthday! She is gf, ef, df, sf, & nut free.
You usually need to increase the oil for gluten-free, have a look at my gluten-free chocolate cake for a more full description of changes you need to make to adjust a cake for gluten-free. It’s strawberry essence or extract or flavor and yes it is imitation. I just looked up Preema and it could be fine, but it might be stronger than what I’ve used. Mine doesn’t say ‘concentrated’ it’s just a regular strawberry essence. Some have made this cake without using the essence and said the strawberry flavor was still good. It’s always a good idea to test it anyway. The pink color doesn’t come from the strawberries or the strawberry essence it’s from pink food coloring. All the best! 🙂
Thank you for making a recipe all from scratch! I’m looking forward to making this.
You’re welcome! Let us know how it turns out! 🙂
I made this over the weekend for a friend’s birthday and it was fun and had a delicious strawberry-flavor. Some tweaks were necessary though….The frosting recipe calls for using 4 cups of powdered sugar. That seemed like a whole lot, so I cut it down to 2 cups and it was still well over what was needed for this cake! Maybe the conversations from grams to ounces was off? (I’ll use the rest for another go at it!). Also, in the US the standard size for cake pans is 8 or 9 inches, so I didn’t have the 7″ that you used and unfortunately I didn’t notice that until it was too late. My two cakes were wider but but not as high, which was no big deal, but it wasn’t what I was hoping for. Lastly, I personally do not think an entire cup of sugar is needed for the cake since the frosting is very, very sweet. I used 3/4 and maybe would use even less next time. Thanks again for the fun recipe.
★★★
Hey Andrea, I do use a lot of frosting on my cakes you can see from the pics, it is quite thick! So it definitely is 4 cups used. As far as the sugar in the cake, that’s personal preference, I consider the sweetness of the cake to be absolutely perfect.
The cake was great! It tasted just like regular cake. Def a hit with my family!
★★★★★
Awesome Renee! So happy to hear! 🙂
This would have been so perfect for Valentine’s Day! Such a pretty cake, looks delicious. 🙂
Yes, great for Valentines (there’s always next year!) or any romantic occasion really! 🙂
My DF EF son has asked for a strawberry cake for his birthday, but they are no longer in season here! Could I purée frozen strawberries instead?
I don’t see why not! Let them thaw and then purée them as usual. 🙂
Wanting to try this, do you think replacing lemon juice for the strawberry extract might be ok to make it a lemon strawberry cake?
Sure! 🙂
Hi! Just wondering if I could use the En-r-g Egg Replacer instead of a flax egg?
Thanks!
It should be okay! 🙂
How big is this cake? I made it and it turned out very thin and the icing barely covered the cake. I’m at a loss!
It’s made in 7 inch cake tins as mentioned in the recipe.
Is the cake batter supposed to be like dough? Almost like a pizza dough. And is it supposed to bake like a bread? I didn’t seem to have enough batter to fill the two baking pans. Help!
The batter is supposed to be thick but definitely not like pizza dough. Did you weigh your flour by any chance or could you have used too much? What size are your baking pans? This cake was made for 7 inch pans so quite small.
Hi Alison,
I have 2 cake pans that aren’t the same size listed in your recipe (one is small , i think 5″ wide and the other about 11″). Do you think I could use either pan and just adjust the baking time until the batter is cooked?
I’d just rather not buy 2 more cake pans and would like to use the ones I already have.
Hope to hear back soon!
Hi Michelle, that’s really tricky, you could try the 11 inch pan for a single layer cake, and bake it a few minutes longer, but I don’t really know how the results would be, it would be a try it and see situation! Since you only have one 5 inch pan I think that option is definitely out. Let us know how it goes! 🙂
Hi ! I made this cake yesterday as a trial run for my niece’s graduation. I left out the essence since I did not have it and used 2- 8 1/2 inch pans and baked for 20 minutes. They came out perfectly. I did not have enough strawberries so I just made a coconut milk buttercream frosting. The cake was so good they didnt know it was vegan until I told them. I was extremely pleased with the outcome and cannot wait to make it for my niece, Thanks for the great recipe and loo forward to making it next week!
★★★★★
That’s fantastic Cathleen, thanks so much for sharing your adjustments. It’s always the best when people don’t know it’s vegan until you tell them. 😊
How did you make your coconut milk buttercream frosting?
What would you suggest as a replacement for sugar for this cake?
Hi Alison, I wanted you to know that I made your cake for my granddaughters 3rd Birthday. She wanted a pink cake. It was perfect! Thank you so much. It was just what I was looking for. I used 2 6 x 2 pans for a small cake.
★★★★★
Hi Dee! That’s awesome, I’m so pleased to hear it was perfect! Thanks so much for posting, I can just imagine it must have been gorgeous and tall in 6 inch pans. 🙂
Made this for my sons 20th birthday and he loved it. I had to use Duncan Hines frosting ( believe it or not it’s vegan according to PETA) due to the fact that confectioners sugar that they sell is not vegan and didn’t have time to order from Amazon. I added the strawberry purée to that Frosting and it was a success. Thank you for this recipe!
★★★★★
Awesome to hear it was a success! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
I made this as cupcakes and they were great. Actually the cupcakes were lighter then the cake (I made both actually testing), though the cake was still very good and moist and I had no issue devouring it. I had to use frozen strawberries (thawed) and then made puree and also did not have strawberry essence, but it was fine. You got the point it was strawberry cake.
★★★★★
Awesome, thanks so much for sharing Bartica! 🙂
1 Tbsp of food coloring is a huge amount! I used 30 drops (1/10 of the amount given here) and i got a nice deep pink. I was unable to find strawberry essence locally, so i used vanilla and it still had a nice taste. I also used gluten free flour. Yum!
★★★★
Hi, I imagine there might be different strengths with food colors because as you can see from mine the color was not too strong. It could also be that gluten-free flour affects the strength of the color. So glad it worked out well for you and thanks for sharing. 🙂
Can this be made with 9″ pans? I do not have 7″ ones. Also would coconut vinegar work the same as apple cider vinegar? Thank you!
You can double the recipe for 9″ cake pans. Just be careful with the measurements and be very precise and it will be great. 🙂
Thank you!