Delicious, Moist Patriotic Bundt Cake From Scratch

There’s nothing more fun about holidays than sharing a good meal with friends. I made this red white and blue bundt cake for Fourth of July this year, but with the Olympics approaching, I realized this is a perfect dessert to serve at an Olympics viewing party.

My kids have joked that I should open the “It’s Not Pretty But It Sure Tastes Good” Bakery. I’m not a professional cake decorator, and that’s for of the reason I love bundt cakes. You don’t have to decorate bundt cakes. Drizzle a little delicious glaze, and you’re set. This red white and blue bundt cake is gorgeous inside and out with the fun layers of color.

The cake is a moist, delicious bundt cake with the hint of vanilla. Topped with a glaze flavored with a touch of lemon, it isn’t overly sweet. No one needs a heavy, too sweet dessert on the hot days of summer. This red white and blue bundt cake is a perfect alternative.

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While we chose to make a red white and blue bundt cake for the 4th of July, swap out the colors for whatever theme you have. Choose team colors for a football party. Make your cake with a few pastels to celebrate Easter. Select the colors to match your birthday party decor. Your imagination is the only limit!

Bundt cakes aren’t fussy, and this red white and blue bundt cake is no different. Your biggest challenge is greasing the pan properly. If you don’t cover every crevice or use enough flour, the cake will stick in the pan. While you can get creative to remove the cake, it doesn’t always come out perfectly.

What can you do if your cake sticks? First, use a narrow tool like a fondue fork to gently press the cake away from the bundt pan. Next, freeze the cake, which helps pull it away from the edges. Lastly, turn it upsidedown and pray!

Your better call is to grease and flour your pan as well as possible. Use a paper towel to spread the butter on every part of the pan, including the part that sticks up in the middle. Do it a second time to cover anything you might have missed the first time, then add flour to the pan. Turn and shake the pan to ensure the flour coats everything. If the flour doesn’t stick anywhere, go back and grease that portion again. Once the flour coats everything, turn the pan over and tap out any excess.

When I made this, I chose to use egg whites to make the cake a little lighter and to ensure the white portion of the cake is as white as possible. If you aren’t up for separating eggs or are running low on eggs, use 4 whole eggs instead of the 8 egg white. I happened to have made strawberry curd the day before and already had a stockpile of egg whites, so you could choose to go in the reverse. Strawberry curd is another fantastic party food. Simply use it as a fruit dip. Yum!

I love that you can make this red white and blue bundt cake allergy friendly, something we need to all be more and more aware of as friends and friends’ kids have allergies. Substitute coconut oil for butter, and easily swap out coconut or rice milk for the standard milk in the recipe. It include no nuts, leaving gluten as the only potential offender.

How to make a red white and blue bundt cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a bundt pan.

Add butter and sugar along with baking powder and salt to a bowl and beat until lightened in color and texture. Add eggs (or egg whites) one at a time, beating well between additions. Scrape the bowl as needed.

Add a half cup of milk and mix slowly until just combined. Add half the flour and stir. Repeat until all milk and flour are added to the cake batter. Scrape down the sides to ensure everything is incorporated.

Separate the batter into three bowls, somewhat equal amounts in each. Add red food coloring to one bowl. Gel food coloring works best to get a true color. A small dab is plenty. Stir, adding more food coloring as needed. Repeat to make the blue batter in another bowl.

Pour the red batter into the bottom of the greased and floured bundt pan. Ensure it goes all the way around, but it does not need to be exactly even.

Add the white batter over it in a circle to ensure the red batter is completely covered.

Pour the blue batter on top, doing your best to ensure it covers the white batter showing.

Place your red white and blue bundt cake in the 350 degree oven for 40-45 minutes, until the top turns golden and it springs back when you touch it. Remove from the oven and let cool until it reaches room temperature, at least 30 minutes.

Mix together the lemon glaze. Drizzle atop the bundt cake. Let it harden, and serve. This will keep tightly sealed at room temperature for two to three days.

How to get good colors for your red white and blue bundt cake

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I grew up with traditional food coloring in the little dropper bottles shaped like raindrops. They’re great for play dough and pastel colors, but they aren’t vibrant. I also find the taste of the red (and blue) bitter when you add enough to make it dark. Instead, I prefer gel food colors. They come in a huge variety of colors (I have copper and black and violet and all sorts of neat ones), and many are formulated to not taste bitter when added to foods. Yay!

My personal favorite are the Wilton gel icing colors. They come in a set of 12 colors for around $10. To use them, simply dip a toothpick into the gel to scoop out a small amount. Swirl the toothpick into whatever you are coloring to remove the icing color and stir to determine if you need more or not. Use a clean toothpick each time to gather more color.

The biggest factor to a successful red white and blue bundt cake is the bundt pan. I love my Nordicware bundt pan. It has a nonstick finish (but still grease and flour it for this), and it works so much better than the bundt pan my mom passed to me when I grew up. A good bundt pan saves you so much time and frustration!

Lastly, I use this vanilla bean paste for everything I cook. It tastes so much better than the vanilla I grew up using. It is a one to one substitute, and the little flecks of vanilla you can see in your finished product? Just…yum! Trust me on this one. It’s worth the price!

Have you ever made a red white and blue bundt cake? What flavors do you love?

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