The Perfect Yellow Cake For Birthdays and Beyond

I like to keep a few well-loved recipes in my repertoire to make time and time again, and birthday cake is something that I find myself happily making several times a year. I typically turn to a very rich chocolate cake from Ina Garten or a simple vanilla cake from the Magnolia Bakery cookbook. I've noticed, however, that yellow cake is a favorite of many, but until now I'd never thought to make it from scratch.

Most recipes for yellow cake use buttermilk, which differentiates it from a standard vanilla cake. I noticed a particularly mouthwatering photo floating around on Pinterest months ago that I couldn't get out of my head. Rather than buttermilk, this specific recipe calls for butter flavoring, which you can find at cake supply stores or online.

This cake comes together easily. I used two seven-inch cake pans and had a little bit of leftover batter for a few cupcakes. The simple vanilla buttercream frosting is delicious and rich, but I'd like to experiment with some more exciting flavors in the future. It tasted rich, buttery, and slightly sinful. The cake itself was moist and dense, which I appreciated, and one piece was more than enough to keep me satisfied.