This pink champagne cake recipe with champagne frosting is a fun cake perfect for celebrating birthdays, New Years, or Valentine's Day!
Made with a touch of bubbly, this pretty blush champagne cake recipe is a celebration in every bite!
With layers of moist pink champagne infused cake and champagne buttercream frosting, this cake is a perfect choice for birthdays, weddings, or any celebratory special occasion!
Ingredients
- Pink Champagne or Sparkling Wine: You can use Sparkling Rose, Brut, or your favorite pink champagne or sparkling wine. Be sure to use a brand or flavor of champagne you actually like drinking!
- Unsalted Butter: Both the cake and frosting call for unsalted butter, but you can substitute salted butter by decreasing the amount of added salt.
- Egg Whites: you can use either fresh egg whites or boxed egg whites in this recipe.
- Pink Food Coloring (optional): but gives the cake and frosting a pink color.
How to Make
Step 1: Make Frosting
This pink champagne buttercream frosting is my regular champagne frosting recipe made with pink champagne and pink food coloring.
It's super simple to make! Just mix butter until light and creamy, about 2-3 minutes. Then add the powdered sugar and mix on low until crumbly.
Once it's crumbly, turn up the speed and mix another 2-3 minutes until light and fluffy. Then add in the vanilla extract, salt, and champagne reduction, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary.
Then mix in any optional pink food coloring and cover and set aside until the cake has baked and cooled. You can also make the frosting while the cake is baking and cooling as it only takes 10 minutes to make!
Check out the full champagne frosting post for tips, tricks, and how to make the frosting have an even stronger champagne flavor.
Step 2: Make Cake
Prep:
Preheat the oven to 350 ℉. Line cake pans with parchment paper and spray with baking spray or butter and flour. Whisk flour, salt, and baking powder in a medium bowl and set aside.
Make Batter:
Using a large bowl with a handheld mixer, or a standing mixer with a beater attachment, cream softened butter and sugar on medium speed for 2-3 minutes until light and fluffy.
Mix in vanilla and egg whites one at a time, or slowly add boxed egg whites while mixing on low speed. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as necessary, to ensure everything is fully mixed.
Alternate adding the flour mixture and the champagne, starting and ending with the dry ingredients (three additions of flour and two of champagne). Do not overmix, you want to stop as soon as all the flour is incorporated.
If adding pink food coloring, start adding food coloring after the second addition of flour. That way you can add more if needed without over-mixing the batter.
Bake Cake:
Divide the batter evenly between the 3 prepared 6 inch cake pans and smooth with an offset or regular spatula. Bake 25-30 minutes, or until you can poke it with a toothpick and it comes out mostly clean with only a few crumbs on it.
Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then let cool completely on a wire rack before frosting.
Step 3: Frost and Decorate Cake
Be sure to let the cake cool completely before frosting. To frost the cake, add a bit of frosting to a cake stand, serving plate, or cake turntable. Add the first layer of cake and add about ½ cup to ⅔ a cup of frosting and smooth out. Then, add the second layer and repeat adding more frosting and the third layer of cake.
Add a thin crumb coat of frosting around the entire cake to lock in any crumbs and chill the entire cake for at least 20 minutes.
Then add another layer of frosting and smooth it out using a bench scraper or offset spatula. Check out this full post on frosting a layer cake for more tips and tricks.
Add desired decorations and enjoy!
Decorating Champagne Cake
There are so many fun ways to decorate a pink champagne cake! For this cake I used a white chocolate drip, pink and white chocolate covered strawberries, and homemade champagne marshmallows covered in chocolate.
But, you can use fresh or dried flowers, fruit, edible gold, more buttercream frosting, fondant, macarons, sprinkles or any other fun decorations you can think of!
You can also paint the cake with more buttercream, make a rosette cake, or make a fault line cake.
Flavor Variations
For this cake I'm using champagne frosting make with pink champagne, but you can use so many different frosting and filling variations!
Frosting Ideas
- Swiss Meringue Buttercream
- Italian Meringue Buttercream
- Marshmallow Frosting
- Ermine Frosting
- Russian Buttercream
Filling Ideas
Tips and Tricks
- Measure your flour correctly by weighing or using the spoon and swipe method of spooning the flour into the measure cups and swiping the excess off the top with a knife. If you dip the measuring cup directly into the flour, it packs down and you will add too much flour to your recipe.
- Make sure all the ingredients are at room temperature, including butter, eggs and champagne.
- Use gel food coloring for more vibrant colors that won't effect the texture of the cake and frosting.
- Make sure the cake has cooled completely before frosting, or else it can melt the frosting.
- Check out this post on frosting a cake like a professional for tons of tips and tricks for frosting a layer cake.
FAQ
This recipe uses such a small amount of alcohol per serving and the alcohol will bake off in the oven, but if you truly want an alcohol-free champagne cake you can use non-alcoholic champagne, or use whole milk instead of the champagne and add champagne extract for the champagne flavor.
If the pink champagne is a day or two old and no longer carbonated, that should be fine in the recipe. But, do not use champagne that is old enough to spoil and/or has oxidized and no longer tastes good.
This can happen and it is nothing to worry about! Just bake as normal.
Sure, this recipe is fine to use for cupcakes, sheet cakes, or a larger or smaller cake. It will make one 9×13 inch sheet cake or about two dozen cupcakes. Adjust baking times as necessary (about 16-20 minutes for cupcakes or 25-35 minutes for a sheet cake).
Storing and Making Ahead
The individual cake layers and the frosting can both be made 1-2 days in advance and stored tightly wrapped or in an airtight container in the refrigerator or up to 1-2 months in the freezer.
The cake can be frosted cold (it is actually easier to frost this way!). Let the frosting come to room temperature and remix before frosting the cake.
The frosted cake can be stored loosely covered or in a cake container for up to a day at room temperature (provided it's not too warm out and no pastry cream or other perishable fillings or frostings are used).
The frosted cake can also be stored in the refrigerator for a day or two. Let come to room temperature before serving.
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Pink Champagne Cake Recipe
Equipment
- 3 six inch round cake pans
- Hand held mixer or standing mixer
- Parchment Paper
- baking spray, optional
INGREDIENTS
cake
- 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour 281 grams
- 2 ¼ tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp salt
- ¾ cup unsalted butter softened
- 1 ½ cup granulated sugar
- 5 large egg whites 150 grams, boxed or fresh
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 1 cup pink champagne or sparkling wine
- pink gel food coloring optional
Frosting
- 1.5 cups unsalted butter 3 sticks
- 6 cups powdered sugar 1 ½ pounds
- 2/3 cup pink champagne or sparkling wine
- pinch salt omit if using salted butter
- pink gel food coloring optional
- 1 tsp vanilla extract optional
Decorations (optional)
Instructions
Frosting
- Add the champagne to a medium saucepan and heat over medium high until boiling. Watch closely, and as soon as it starts boiling, turn to a simmer and continue cooking for about 5-8 minutes until the chapagne has reduced by over half.
- Once you have about 1/4 cup of the reduced champagne, let cool completely before moving to the enxt step (or else it will melt your frositng).
- Once the champagne has cooled, add the softened butter to the bowl of a standing mixer or hand held mixer and mix 2-3 minutes in light and fluffy.
- Add powdered sugar and mix on low until it starts to look crumbly. Add in vanilla, champagne, and salt. Mix until combined.
- Cover and set aside until ready to frost cake. This can be made 1-2 days in advance and stored in an airtight container in the fridge. Let come to room temperature and remix before using.
- When crumbly, turn up speed to medium/medium high and mix 3-5 minutes until light and fluffy. Add in champagne, vanilla, salt, and food coloring and mix until combined.
- Cover until ready to frost the cake.
Cake
- Preheat oven to 350 ℉.
- Line the bottoms of three 6 inch round cake pans with parchment paper and spray with baking spray or cover in butter and flour. Set aside.
- Whisk flour, salt, and baking powder in a medium bowl and set aside.
- In a bowl, cream softened butter and sugar on medium speed for 2-3 minutes until light and fluffy.
- Mix in vanilla and egg whites one at a time, or slowly add boxed egg whites while mixing on low speed. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as necessary to ensure everything is fully mixed.
- Alternate adding the dry flour mixture and the champagne, starting and ending with the flour (three additions of flour and two of champagne). Do not over-mix, you want to stop as soon as all the flour is incorporated.
- If adding pink food coloring, start adding after the second addition of flour. That way you can add more if needed without overmixing the batter.
- Divide the batter evenly between the 3 prepared cake pans and smooth with an offset or regular spatula.
- Bake 25-30 minutes, or until you can poke the middle of the cakes with a toothpick and it comes out mostly clean with only a few crumbs on it.
- Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then let cool completely on a wire rack before frosting.
- Frost the layer cake and add any decorations. Enjoy!
Notes
- Measure your flour correctly by weighing or using the spoon and swipe method of spooning the flour into the measure cups and swiping the excess off the top with a knife. If you dip the measuring cup directly into the flour, it packs down and you will add too much flour to your recipe.
- Make sure all the ingredients are at room temperature, including butter, eggs and champagne.
- Use gel food coloring for more vibrant colors that won't effect the texture of the cake and frosting.
- Make sure the cake has cooled completely before frosting, or else it can melt the frosting.
- Check out this post on frosting a cake like a professional for tons of tips and tricks for frosting a layer cake.
Melodie says
This was so fun to make! I ended up making two of these, one with the 6″ pans for work and one with two 8″ pans for home. I also made chocolate covered strawberries to line along the side. So yummy!
Rb says
How did you adjust the baking time for two 8′ pans??
Michele says
Made this cake for new years and it is amazing, so flavorful & moist!