Ultimate Caramel Cake and 60 Birthday Cakes Collection (2024)

4.50 from 2 votes

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Prep Time: 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 23 minutes minutes

Cool:: 1 hour hour

Total Time: 1 hour hour 43 minutes minutes

Author: Lyuba Brooke

• ▢ Cake:
• ▢ 3/4 cup unsalted butter softened
• ▢ 1 cup sugar
• ▢ 3 eggs room temperature
• ▢ 2 1/2 cups cake flour
• ▢ 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
• ▢ 1/2 tsp salt
• ▢ 2 tsp vanilla extract
• ▢ 1 1/4 cups whole milk
• ▢ Dulce se Leche Buttercream:
• ▢ 1/2 cup unsalted butter softened
• ▢ 10 oz Dulce de Leche
• ▢ 2-3 Tbsp meringue powder for stabilizing
• ▢ If you prefer to use powdered sugar, use 1/2 to 1 cup of powder sugar.
• ▢ Homemade Caramel:
• ▢ 3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
• ▢ 2 cup white granulated sugar
• ▢ 8 tbs unsalted butter

• Cake:

• Preheat oven to 350. Grease and lightly flour 3, 8-inch round baking pans. (To flour the pans: grease with cooking spray then add some flour. Pat baking pan so that it's lightly covered in flour all over the inside, then turn the pan upside down and lightly pat to discard loose flour. **I do recommend using 3 cake pans at a time because it will be much easier to divide all the batter equally among the pans.)

• Have all your ingredients ready.

• Beat butter in the electric mixer on high, for about a minute. Add sugar and beat for another minute or two, until light and fluffy.

• Add eggs, one at a time, beating on medium-high speed after each addition. Add vanilla extract.

• Sift flour, baking powder and salt together.

• Lower the speed to low and add half the flour mixture.

• Add half the milk.

• Add remaining flour and after it's just incorporated, add remaining milk.

• Scrape sides and bottom of the bowl and mix until all ingredients are just combined.

• Separate the batter between the baking pans, evenly, and bake for 18-23 minutes.

• Let the cakes cool for about 10 minutes and then take them out of the pans. Let them cool completely on a rack before adding filling or it will melt.

• Buttercream:

• Beat butter in the electric mixer for a couple of minutes, on high speed, and add Dulce de Leche. Beat for 5-7 minutes, until light in color and fluffy. Beat in meringue powder, make sure it's mixed in well and set aside the frosting. (If using powder sugar, beat it with butter.)

• Caramel:

• * Do not walk away. Keep a close eye on sugar.23*

• Preheat a heavy-bottom sauce pot over medium heat. Spread sugar in the pot evenly.

• When sugar begins to melt, start stirring with a wooden spoon. Keep stirring slowly as the sugar melts and starts to turn brown.

• When the sugar reached deep brown color (350 degrees F), add butter and stir constantly. (Be careful here, the mixture will bubble and it lava-hot!)

• When butter is all melted, you will notice that it gets thicker and looks more like caramel (You may have to switch to silicone covered whisk here). Take off heat.

• Slowly, add heavy cream while stirring. When the mixture is all smooth, let it stand until cools to room temperature and settles.

• When everything is cooled, divide filling among two center cake layers. Pour about half of caramel over the cake. You can use remaining caramel on individual slices of refrigerate it.