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–+ servings
A slice of blue velvet cake on a white plate ready to serve
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5 from 2 votes

Blue Velvet Cake Recipe

Subtle chocolate flavor with a slight tang and a perfectly moist cake base come together with a stunning color in this Blue Velvet Cake Recipe!
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 1 hour 30 minutes
Total Time 2 hours
Servings 22 servings
Author Jocelyn Delk Adams

Ingredients

For the Cake

  • 2 1/2 cups sifted all purpose flour
  • 2 cups granulated sugar
  • 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 1/3 cups vegetable oil
  • 1 cup buttermilk room temperature
  • 2 large eggs room temperature
  • 1/4 cup strong coffee hot
  • 2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 tsp apple cider vinegar
  • blue food coloring see notes below

For the Cream Cheese Frosting

  • 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
  • 32 oz cream cheese softened but still a tiny stiff
  • 7 cups confectioner's sugar to stiffen more, go up to 8 cups
  • 1 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 tbsp vanilla extract

Instructions

For the Cake

  • Preheat oven to 325°F. Grease 3 9-inch round cake pans.
  • In a stand mixer with whisk attachment, mix flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt on low. Gradually add oil and buttermilk.
  • Increase speed to medium-low; add eggs one at a time, scraping the bowl after each. Slowly add coffee, vanilla, vinegar, and food coloring. Mix until just combined, avoiding overmixing.
  • Divide batter evenly among pans. Bake 20-27 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Don't overbake.
  • Cool in pans for 10 minutes, then invert onto wire racks to cool completely. Cover lightly to prevent drying.

For the Cream Cheese Frosting

  • Beat butter and cream cheese in a mixer until thickening.
  • Slowly add confectioner’s sugar; once incorporated, increase speed to high.
  • Add salt and vanilla, continue whipping until smooth.

Notes

How to Get the Royal Blue Color

Unlike red velvet, you cannot just go to the store and purchase a bottle of blue velvet food coloring and flavoring. You also will not be able to get the same saturation and vibrancy from a standard blue food coloring.
To get the perfect color, you'll want to get cake food coloring and do a combination of primarily blue with a couple drops of black and red. (If you have a specific amount of each I recommend adding it here). Use a rubber spatula to continuously fold the cream cheese frosting on itself until the frosting color is consistent.
Here we actually used a mix of 2 tsp Sky blue and 1/8th tsp violet gel food coloring to get this coloring. Feel free to play around and figure out what will best work for the color you want. The brown from the cocoa makes it much harder to achieve this.