Learn how to make a layer cake like a pro baker with essential tips for perfectly even layers, smooth frosting techniques, and simple decorating tricks that transform ordinary cake layers into spectacular desserts anyone can create at home.
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This guide will share foolproof baking tips and techniques for creating stunning layer cakes at home!
From properly preparing pans and achieving perfectly even layers to mastering smooth frosting application and decorating like a pro, this comprehensive guide shares professional secrets for baking, assembling, and serving beautiful layer cakes that taste as amazing as they look.
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My Favorite Layer Cakes
Here are my very favorite layer cakes, complete with recipes for the cakes and frosting. Grab one of the recipes (or all 3!) and keep reading for the tips that will make your cake just as beautiful!
- Triple Layer Chocolate Cake with a Coconut Cream Cheese Filling
- Strawberry Cake
- Chocolate Cheesecake Cake
Foolproof Guide For How To Make A Layer Cake
Whether you’re baking for a birthday, celebration, or just because you’re craving something sweet, these tips will help you create a bakery-worthy cake that tastes as good as it looks!
Preparation Essentials
Before you dive into mixing your batter, proper preparation will set you up for success:
Get your ingredients ready: Make sure everything is at room temperature before you begin. This helps ingredients incorporate more evenly and creates a better texture in your finished cake.
Prepare your pans properly: This might seem like a small detail, but it makes a world of difference! Use your cake pans to trace circles onto parchment paper, then cut them out to fit perfectly in the bottom of each pan. Spray both the bottom and sides of your pans with nonstick spray, then place the parchment inside. This two-step process ensures your cakes will release cleanly every time.
Weigh your batter: For perfectly even layers, use a digital kitchen scale to divide your batter equally between pans. No more guessing and ending up with one thick layer and one thin one!
The Baking Process
Knowing when your cake is done takes a bit of practice, but there are clear signs to watch for:
- The cake will begin to pull away from the sides of the pan when it’s done. When you gently touch the middle, it should feel firm but bounce back slightly under your finger.
- A pro tip I’ve learned over the years: stay in the kitchen while your cakes are baking. With practice, you’ll actually be able to smell when they’re perfectly done! It’s one of those baking secrets that isn’t in any recipe.
Cooling and Removing From Pans
This is where many beginners run into trouble, but with the right technique, you’ll never leave half your cake stuck in the pan again:
- Let your cakes cool on a wire rack for about 10 minutes after taking them out of the oven.
- If the edges haven’t already pulled away, gently loosen them with a butter knife or thin spatula.
- Place a cooling rack upside down on top of the cake pan, then using two hot pads, grab both the rack and pan together and flip them over in one smooth motion. Your cake should fall right onto the rack.
- If your cake is stubborn and doesn’t release, flip everything back over and use your thin spatula to gently lift any stuck areas.
- Your cake will now be upside down. Carefully peel off the parchment paper, place another cooling rack on top, and gently flip it right-side up.
Make-Ahead Options
One of my favorite tricks is freezing cake layers before decorating them. They’re firmer and much easier to work with, plus you can make them 2-3 weeks in advance—perfect for planning ahead for special occasions!
To freeze properly:
- Cool your cakes completely on the rack.
- I like to put the removed parchment paper back on top of the cake and flip it again so it doesn’t stick to the wire rack.
- Freeze the layers uncovered on the wire rack until solid.
- Once frozen, wrap tightly in plastic wrap to store.
When you’re ready to decorate, you don’t need to thaw the layers first — they’re actually easier to work with while still frozen and will thaw quickly as you decorate.
However, if you’re using buttercream frosting, you should thaw the layers first. As a professional baker once told me, “If you frost frozen cakes with buttercream, the icing will crack as the cake thaws and expands.”
Frosting Techniques
For that perfectly smooth, professional-looking frosting:
Start with a crumb coat: Apply a quick, thin layer of frosting to lock in any loose crumbs. This creates a clean canvas for your final frosting layer. After applying the crumb coat, refrigerate the cake for about 30 minutes until the frosting feels set to the touch.
Perfect your technique: When applying the final coat, start on top with a generous blob of frosting. Gently push the frosting in a circle in one direction (not back and forth), smoothing as you go. Then add more frosting and push it over the sides.
Keep it clean: Work with a clean spatula by wiping it off with a paper towel regularly. An offset spatula and a revolving cake stand make this process much easier!
Prevent oozing fillings: Make sure your filling is thick enough so it won’t squeeze out. Spread it almost to the edge, then gently press the next layer on top. If any filling escapes, use a dry spatula to remove the excess or gently push it back where it belongs.
Decorating Your Masterpiece
Timing is everything when adding decorations to your cake. Apply them while the frosting is still wet so they’ll stick properly. If your frosting starts to dry before you finish decorating, you can usually wipe away a little frosting to make it sticky again.
Storing Your Creation
Whether your finished cake needs refrigeration depends on your filling:
- Cakes with cream cheese fillings, puddings, or other perishable fillings should be refrigerated until about 30 minutes before serving.
- Cakes with shelf-stable fillings can be stored at room temperature under a cake dome.
Serving Your Layer Cake
For beautiful, clean slices:
- Always clean your knife between cuts.
- Warm the knife under hot water before each slice.
- Dry the knife, cut, then rinse and repeat for each slice.
These simple steps prevent frosting and cake from building up on the knife and give you picture-perfect portions every time.
Cake Baking Tools
These are the tools I use over and over again, every single time I make cake — be it multiple layers or just one!
- Round Cake Pans: 8-inch and 9-inch are the ones I use the most.
- Offset Spatulas: Get a small one and a larger one for different frosting needs.
- Revolving Cake Stand: A luxury that makes frosting round cakes much easier!
- Cake Rounds: Coated cardboard bases that make transferring cake layers less stressful. (Ask me how I know!)
- Wire Cooling Racks: Quicken cake cooling with these multipurpose racks.
- Digital Food Scale: This makes it so much easier to get the same amount of batter in each cake pan.
- Parchment Paper: Use the uncut multipurpose rolls to cut your own rounds or get the conveniently pre-sized and cut rounds for your pan sizes — 8-inch and 9-inch.
Happy Baking!
Layer cakes might seem intimidating at first, but with these tips and a little practice, you’ll be creating stunning, delicious cakes that would make any professional baker proud.
Like any worthwhile kitchen skill, each cake you make will be better than the last as you develop your own tricks and techniques.
Whether you’re baking a chocolate layer cake with coconut cream cheese filling, a special birthday cake for someone you love, or experimenting with new flavor combinations, these foundational techniques will help you create a cake that’s as beautiful as it is delicious.
Anita
I stack my wedding cakes using dowel rods and cake boards, but when removing the cake board from the tier beneath it, the frosting is removed with the cake board. Is there a technique to prevent the frosting from sticking to the cake board?
Barbara Schieving
Hi Anita – I’m sorry, I don’t have any experience making tiered wedding cakes. Perhaps Annalise can help https://www.completelydelicious.com/another-wedding-cake/
TERESA AUSTIN
PLEASE HELP….HOW DO YOU STACK A 3 LAYER CAKE,I NEED TO KNOW DOES THE BOTTOM LAYER GO ON SMOOTH SIDE UP OR DOWN AND WHICH WAY DO YOU STACK THE OTHER 2 LAYERS.
Barbara Schieving
Hi Teresa – Typically you’ll stack the two bottom layers right side up (flat side on the bottom) and the top layer upside down (flat side on the top.) If they’re domed, then you’ll trim them so they’re level.
Amy B.
Just wanted to say thank you!!!! Freezing cakes in wax paper worked amazingly, and made using fondant SO SO much easier!!!! Cakes turned out brilliant!!!
Barbara Schieving
Great – thanks Amy!
Lezlie
How much filling do you use between layers so it looks nice a even when cut through?
Barbara Schieving
The easiest way to divide the filling evenly is to use a digital scale and weigh it.
Sang Dsouza
Hello Barbara,
Thank you for all the wonderful tips. I am sure many have asked this question, when you say freeze the cake after it cools. Do you mean keep it in the deep freezer? Wer it wud get super hard?
I am using a box cake mix to bake a cake on Wednesday, cool it and freeze it. Then Thursday once I return from work Frost it and refrigerator it to celebrate on Friday. Is this correct?
Also can u please share some easy frosting buttercream recipes.
Thanks
Barbara Schieving
Yes, I mean a deep freezer. Cake does not freeze super hard and thaws quickly. Baking it on Wednesday, decorating it on Thursday and serving on Friday should work well. I am not a fan of buttercream. In fact I did a round up of decorating cakes without buttercream https://www.barbarabakes.com/cake-decorating-ideas-without-buttercream/ Here’s some good posts about buttercream if you love it https://www.handletheheat.com/6-secrets-perfect-buttercream/ https://selfproclaimedfoodie.com/perfect-buttercream-frosting/
Quinn
Can you tell me why once I bake make cakes and try to stack them for frosting they are not the same siZe and I usually have to fill in the sides with more icing? Should I stack them in a certain way?quintina
Barbara Schieving
Hi Quintina – Some cake pans don’t have straight sides so the sides won’t match up. Some cakes dome so much in the middle that there is a big gap between the layers. Professional bakers trim their cakes to get more even layers. Here’s info on trimming of the top if your cake is domed in the middle. https://www.seriouseats.com/2017/05/how-to-level-a-cake.html Although if my cake layer had as little dome as the one in the video, I would not bother trimming it. 🙂
Jane
This has been so helpful as I’m preparing to make a layered cake for my daughter’s birthday soon. A couple of questions.. I plan bake the cake on Thursday, decorate on Friday, with the party on Saturday. Would you freeze the cake from Thursday to Friday and icing it while frozen? Or let it thaw before icing? Or just keep it in the fridge from Thursday to Friday?
Once finished on Friday, should I keep it in the fridge? It’s a white cake with buttercream icing. Thanks in advance!
Barbara Schieving
Hi Jane – glad it was helpful. I would freeze the cake because it will be easier to handle on Friday. You can do the crumb coat on a frozen cake – no need to thaw. Generally the cake will thaw while you’re doing the crumb coat and waiting for the crumb coat to set in the fridge. Yes, I could keep the cake in the fridge when it’s finished on Friday. I’d love to see the cake. You can share it on my Facebook page or Instagram. Have fun!
Janet Kaufman
I recently baked a red velvet cake and I used wooden toothpicks to check for doneness. The toothpick came out clean but the cake was still jiggly. Why didn’t the batter stick to the toothpick? I baked it several minutes longer till it stopped jiggling.
Barbara Schieving
Hi Janet – I find the toothpick test is often inaccurate that’s why I recommend the other ways for checking when your cake is done. However, it’s usually the opposite for me, the toothpick comes out wet when the cake is actually done cooking. Your toothpick must have just found an air pocket or something like that.
Monikka
If stored in the fridge, can you frost the cake a couple days in advance of eating it?
Barbara Schieving
Hi Monikka – you can frost it the day before, but a couple days in advance I wouldn’t recommend.
Marcie
Great tips. Very helpful.
marylou harmeling
when baking 3 layers, how are the pans placed in the oven?
Barbara Schieving
Hi Marylou – I talk about baking the 3 layers in this post https://www.barbarabakes.com/triple-layer-chocolate-cake-coconut-cream-cheese-filling/
Pilar barrios Farmer
Another way to bake even layers, especially larger cakes I use metal flower nails spray them completely with non stick spray and put them into the center of cake pans filled with batter. They get hot and help bake the center of the cake evenly.
I use 4 for 12″, 3 for 10″ .
Barbara Schieving
Thanks for sharing!
Dawnitha
I have not heard of flower nails. Do you put them into to cake pan and then pour batter into cake pans. What happens to the flower nails, do you pull them out. HELP, EXPLAIN! Dawnitha
Barbara Schieving
Here’s a good tutorial on use the flower nail http://www.cakecentral.com/tutorial/20232/cake-baking-flower-nail-method-tutorial
Jess
Thank you for these tips. The one that has helped me and is so simple is after the crumb coating to put it in the fridge to harded before adding the next layer. Not doing this has caused several headaches through the years of me frosting cakes. Thanks for that! So simple!
Ellen
I need to make a cake(without frosting) and bring with me in a suitcase to Europe. Do you think freezing would help – any suggestion??
Barbara Schieving
Hi Ellen – cake thaws pretty quickly so I’m not sure freezing it would make much difference unless you had it packed in a special refrigerated box. If you want it in a suitcase you’re going to have to package it super well. I’d probably buy some sturdy cardboard cake rounds for the top and the bottom. Maybe use some dowels to give it support. Put it in a plastic cake container if you have one, or wrap it in foil and bubble wrap. I’ve never actually done it, but that’s what I would try. Good luck!
margaret
my round cakes always rise up in middle when baking so i have to cut off top of each cake. . yours look flat. is this a step you have forgotten?
Barbara Schieving
Hi Margaret – I have some favorite cakes that don’t dome very much when cooking. So I rarely have to trim the top of the cake. https://www.barbarabakes.com/old-fashioned-chocolate-cake-with-maraschino-cherry-filling/
My friend Annalise from Completely Delicious uses this technique to avoid doming: I reduce the heat from 350 degrees F to 300 degrees F and increase the baking time. The lower temperatures bake the cake slower, which prevents it from doming. A good rule of thumb when you reduce the temperature is to bake it for one and a half times as long as the recipe originally suggests. So if the recipe says 60 minutes at 350 degrees, it will take approximately 90 minutes at 300 degrees. But keep an eye on it! Check it periodically after the original suggested time to be sure you don’t over bake it.
They also sell baking strips you can wrap around your pans that are suppose to help doming. http://amzn.to/2lpQGIb
Hope that helps.
Diane Wolff
Lower you baking temp by 25 degrees, and purchase some oven baking strips that wrap around your baking pan. I have been baking cakes for 35 years and swear by them. You moisten the strips and wrap the outside of the pan to help keep the heat evenly moving around you pan. The strips help the layers bake evenly. D
Bhumika
Thankyou so much for your wonderful tips.I am new to baking and these tips have really sorted me out.I do have one more question.I have a small opening which I can put only one cake.But if I want to make two cakes with the same batter can the remaining batter (For 2nd cake)wait for 40-45minutes till my first cake is baking.I was wonderingthat the air trapped in batter will sit.
Barbara Schieving
Thanks – glad they are helpful. It really depends on the cake – if it’s a sponge cake with lots of eggs that is the cake’s leavening you may see a big difference in the two cakes. But if it uses chemical leavening, baking soda or powder, there probably won’t be as much of a difference.
Eman
Thanks very much for your tips …
Do you have a youtube channel or facebook page or any way to communicate?
Thanks in advance …
Barbara Schieving
Hi Eman – yes, I have a Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/BarbaraBakes/ and a You Tube Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKczRRMaTL1_16Jp3VGujYg/videos.
KELMA
I JUST GOT A NEW GAS STOVE, I’M REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO MAKE YOUR RECIPES THANKS
Zarina
Thank you for the lovely helpful tips
Kasandra
Thank you for the tip’s. I will be looking for the cake strips you called them? I never knew I could bake in advance and freeze. This is going to make it so much easier on me. I make cakes all the time from scratch and end up taking all day to do it. So again thank you so much.
Barbara Schieving
Thanks Kasandra – it really does help to break up the process. Decorating seems so much more fun when all the work was done another day. Have fun!