Pink Champagne Cake

I've been looking for champagne cake recipe for a while, and I kept coming across ones that where made with box cake mix or just sounded so so. My plan was to make a Pink Champagne Cake for New Years Eve, I totally think you should you should ring in the New Year with a slice of champagne cake and glass of blubby toasting to the good life and promising of the year ahead! Life is about celebrating the moments and Pink Champagne Cake is a perfect celebratory cake. 

I found a fantastic recipe on a Half-BakedBaker  her recipe is from the cake book Brooze Hounds. I recently shared the Pink Champagne Cake on Instagram and wanted to share the the actual recipe here. This cake is super easy and fun to make, while your making your cake, I can guarantee you'll be smelling the cake batter and saying yummy!

The cake turned out amazing and super moist! The cake is such a pretty pale blush pink and the frosting a pretty ballerina pink. My husband isn't huge on frosting, so I decided to only frost the middle layer and top of my cake and used only half of the recipe for the frosting. The frosting is super yummy and once set has this pretty glaze look, that reminds me of glazed surgery doughnut. 

Pink Champagne Cake

3 cups all-purpose flour
3 tsp. baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature 
2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon of vanilla extract
6 egg whites
2 cups pink Champagne at room temperature
2-3 drops of red gel food coloring 

For the Champagne / Sparkling Wine, I used a sweet one. I used a inexpensive bottle of Pink Blush from Andre and would totally do that again! Martini & Ross Asti is also a good choice for this cake. 

Pink Champagne Vanilla Frosting

1 cup  unsalted butter
8 cups confectioners sugar
2 -3 Tablespoons pink Champagne
1/4 cup whole milk, or enough to get the proper consistency
1 teaspoons vanilla extract
1-2 drops of red gel food coloring. I thought one drop was perfect to create a pretty ballerina pink shade. 

Baking the Cake

Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees and grease two 9 inch round cake pans, you can also slightly dust the inside with flour for ease of removing the cake from the pan. In a large mixing bowl add flour, baking powder and salt, then set aside. In a large mixing bowl, beat butter and sugar 5 minutes together for or until light and fluffy. Add your egg whites in one at a time. Next mix in your vanilla. Start adding in your flour mixture, then champagne and alternate between the two. Make sure you start with flour and end with flour. Next scrape the sides of the bowl done and then add in your food coloring. I used 2-3 drops of coloring for my cake batter. 

Next, evenly pour batter into pans and bake 30-35 minutes, or until a toothpick when inserted in the center comes out clean. Let your cake cool on a rack before removing from pan. The cake should remove very easliy from the cake pan, if not try these suggestions from Better Homes and Gardens, How to Remove a Cake from a Pan.

Making the Frosting

In a mixing bowl, beat butter 1 minute. Gradually add the confectioners' sugar, Champagne, milk, vanilla, and 1 drop of food coloring; beat until smooth and spreadable. Make sure you fully mix in the food coloring into the frosting. This frosting is super pretty and has a sheen like appearance thank looks even prettier in a shade of pink. As I mentioned above, I halved the frosting recipe and only put frosting in the middle and on top, the cake is sweet enough, rich that you don't miss the frosting on the sides. 

Lastly cut your cake and enjoy! I'm making this cake tonight to celebrate the New Year with our friends and can't wait to make it again!! This time, I won't be so impatient and I'll cool the cake layers in the fridge before frosting! If you make this cake, I'd love to hear your thoughts , enjoy!