How to Make Box Cake Better (Almost Scratch Cake)

Take your box cake mix to the next level with this easy recipe! A few simple additions make it extra moist and delicious.

Alright, *almost* scratch cake is a bit of a stretch. It’s mostly a box cake with stuff added in to make it even better.

Some bakers scoff at box mixes, think it’s sacrilege and only bake from scratch. I’m a whatever-works-for-you kinda baker and sometimes it’s just easier to whip out a box.

How to Make Box Cake Better

Adding a few simple ingredients makes a world of difference. Trust me you will never go back to a plain old box cake mix ever again!

Here’s what you’ll need:

box cake mix

all-purpose flour

sugar

salt

large eggs

water (or milk)

vegetable oil

vanilla

sour cream

The sour cream is the secret ingredient I think that makes this doctored box mix extra moist and flavourful.

I recommend using full-fat sour cream because really, we’re not about saving calories at this point, right?

Boxed Cake Mix Recipe

Making this cake is just as simple as any box mix, just with a couple of other ingredients. To make it all you need to do is:

whisk the dry ingredients together

add the wet ingredients

mix on low until combined

This recipe works great for two 8″ cake pans or three 6″ pans. It can be scaled up for larger pans though too. I use this site as a guideline when I’m scaling recipes up or down.

I like to use Homemade Cake Release on my pans and line them with parchment to make sure the cakes come out perfect every time.

I also use Baking Strips around the sides of my cake pans to make sure the cakes bake perfectly flat and don’t require any trimming (no wasted cake scraps!).

If you’d like to make your cake extra moist (or if you’re worried you’ve over baked it) you can add some Simple Syrup to the cooled cake layers. I recommend trimming a bit of the top crust first so the syrup really soaks into the cakes.

These days I mostly bake from scratch, but I used to use this recipe all the time when I was focussing on cake decorating. It bakes up a very sturdy and delicious cake!

I’ve yet to recreate the delicious flavour and texture of a classic vanilla box mix cake though. My Vanilla Cake recipe comes close, but it’s not quite the same. It is delicious though too, so you should try it if you haven’t!

I really like this recipe because it makes the box mixes a little more dense and super moist. This recipe is GREAT for a cake that will be decorated, stacked, etc. as the cakes have really good structural integrity.

The nutritional information and metric conversions are calculated automatically. I cannot guarantee the accuracy of this data. If this is important to you, please verify with your favorite nutrition calculator and/or metric conversion tool.

Originally published on Oct 10, 2014

Learn How to Bake the Perfect Cake!

Tips, techniques, and troubleshooting to help ensure your cakes come out perfect every single time!