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This Berry Mascarpone Layer Cake has layers of fluffy vanilla cake, fresh berry filling and mascarpone whipped cream frosting! It’s light, fruity and perfect for spring!
Berry Mascarpone Layer Cake
I never really realized how much of an effect caffeine has until I stopped drinking it recently. As part of the IVF process, caffeine isn’t really recommended so I’ve been doing my best to not drink it. Since soda has less caffeine than coffee, I’ll have a little if I’m desperate. I’d rather have coffee though. 🙁 Much more yummy.
Point is though – the lack of a picker-upper is brutal! And the tiredness is making me crave a way to increase energy so now I just want to eat all the carbs and sugar, which I’m also avoiding. Sometimes I feel like I just can’t eat anything. It’s not a good situation. I’ve gotta find a way to muster up some energy!
My go-to move right now is to play some of my favorite music and dance around while working. Gets the blood flowing and pumps me up. 🙂 Yay for 90s music! That’s my era.
And this is my cake.
Boy, do I love this cake! Fresh berries are some of the best things ever and we’ve had them galore for the last month or so. I can’t get enough of them! Especially the blueberries and strawberries. I just want to eat a carton at a time. And I can eat fruit – yay! 🙂
How to Make Berry Mascarpone Layer Cake
This cake starts with a moist and easy vanilla cake. The batter is so easy to put together, you could simply use a whisk to combine everything if you wanted. I always love a good stand mixer – it takes the work out of it for you – but you could do it by hand. Just combine the dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately, then add them all together with a little water. Done! Plus, the ingredients are all nice and straight forward. Rock on.
Then there’s the berry filling. You could almost think of it as a homemade jam, but not quite as thick. I used an even mix of strawberries, blueberries and raspberries, but you could use whatever combo you like. The berries are purred in a food processor, then cooked over heat with some sugar and cornstarch. The heat reduces the liquid a bit and the cornstarch helps thicken everything. Once it’s cooled, you’ve got the perfect berry filling!
The mascarpone whipped cream frosting is used both to add to the cake filling and to frost the cake. I love how light this frosting is! You basically make whipped cream and add mascarpone cheese to it. The mascarpone flavor is lighter than a more straight forward mascarpone frosting, but this version runs much less risk of getting a super soft mascarpone frosting. Just be sure to add the full amount of powdered sugar to make sure the frosting stays stable. It makes a great addition to the cake and keeps things light and fresh!
The final cake is perfect for spring, Easter and all through the summer! It was a huge hit!
Watch How To Make It
SHOP THE RECIPE
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Berry Mascarpone Layer Cake
- Prep Time: 45 minutes
- Cook Time: 26 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour 11 minutes
- Yield: 12-14 Slices
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: American
Description
This Berry Mascarpone Layer Cake has layers of fluffy vanilla cake, fresh berry filling and mascarpone whipped cream frosting! It’s light, fruity and perfect for spring!
Ingredients
VANILLA CAKE
- 2 1/2 cups (325g) all purpose flour
- 2 cups (414g) sugar
- 3 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 cup (240ml) milk
- 1/2 cup (120ml) vegetable oil
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup (240ml) water
BERRY FILLING
- 1 1/2 cup (240g) mixed berries (I used strawberries, blueberries and raspberries)
- 3 tbsp (45ml) water
- 3/4 cup (155g) sugar
- 3 tbsp cornstarch
WHIPPED MASCARPONE FROSTING
- 2 1/2 cups (600ml) heavy whipping cream, cold
- 1 1/2 cups (173g) powdered sugar
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 16 oz (452g) mascarpone cheese, chilled
Instructions
1. Preheat oven to 350°F (176°C) and prepare three 8 inch cake pans with non-stick baking spray and parchment paper in the bottom. These cakes can have a tendency to stick to the pans a bit, so I strongly recommend the parchment paper in the bottom.
2. Add the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt to a large mixer bowl and combine. Set aside.
3. Add the milk, vegetable oil, vanilla extract and eggs to a medium sized bowl and combine.
4. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and beat until well combined.
5. Slowly add the water to the batter and mix on low speed until well combined. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed to make sure everything is well combined.
6. Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cake pans and bake for 24-28 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out with a few moist crumbs.
7. Remove the cakes from oven and allow to cool for 2-3 minutes, then remove to a cooling rack to finish cooling. These cakes can have a tendency to stick to the pans a bit so jiggle them a bit to loosen from the sides of the pan before turning the cakes out to cool.
BERRY FILLING
8. To make the berry topping, add the berries and water to a food processor and puree until smooth. You should end up with about 2/3 cup puree.
9. Combine the sugar and cornstarch in a medium saucepan. Stir in the berry puree.
10. Cook over medium heat, stirring consistently until mixture thickens and comes to a boil, about 8-10 minutes.
11. Allow to boil for 1 minute, then remove from heat. Refrigerate and allow to cool completely.
FROSTING AND ASSEMBLY
12. Add the heavy whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla extract to a large mixer bowl and whip on high speed until soft peaks form.
13. Add the mascarpone cheese to the whipped cream and whip until stiff peaks form. It will happen fairly quickly.
14. To assemble the cake, use a large serrated knife to remove the domes from the top of the cakes.
15. Place the first layer of cake on a serving plate or a cardboard cake round. Pipe a dam of frosting around the outside of the cake. I use Ateco tip 808 for the dam so that it’s tall.
16. Spread half of the berry filling evenly on top of the cake layer, inside the dam. It should fill the dam about half way full.
17. Add some additional mascarpone frosting to the top of the berry filling and spread into an even layer to fill in the remaining dam space.
18. Add the second layer of cake and repeat the filling layer with the remaining berry filling and additional mascarpone frosting.
19. Add the final layer of cake on top, then smooth out the frosting around the sides of the cake.
20. Frost the outside of the cake, then use an icing decorator (I use this Ateco Icing Smoother ) to add a striped pattern to the sides.
21. Finish off the cake with some swirls of frosting and fresh berries.
22. Refrigerate cake until ready to serve. Cake is best for 2-3 days.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Slice
- Calories: 678
- Sugar: 53 g
- Sodium: 216.6 mg
- Fat: 40 g
- Carbohydrates: 74 g
- Protein: 8.7 g
- Cholesterol: 118.4 mg
Enjoy!
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What do you think about putting buttermilk in instead of milk? Will it give the cake more moisture?
I haven’t tried it with this cake, so I’m not sure. You could try it, but it really is quite a moist cake already and doesn’t really need it.
This recipe is ALWAYS a BIG hit! Thank you for sharing.
I’m curious if you have ever modified the mascarpone frosting into a chocolate version? If so, can you share the recipe for that?
I’m so glad to hear that! Yes, I’ve made a chocolate version. For this particular frosting, you can reduce the powdered sugar to 1 cup and add 1/2 cup of cocoa powder.
Hi! I made these as cupcakes and they were perfect! I want to make it as a 12 x 18 sheet cake that has 2″ height. What adjustments do I need to make? Do you think it will be ok to make with that height or should I do 1″ layers?
Glad you enjoyed them! It should be fine as a sheet cake. I’m not sure exactly how much batter you need for that size. I know the amount listed in this recipe works well for a 9 x 13. I’m guessing you may need to double it.
The icing and the filling were good, I did sub a little extra fruit for the amount of cornstarch. The cake recipe made thin dense cakes, almost crepe like but dense. I was nervous of that with a lot of water and no butter being from the south! Overall icing was the best part!!
The cakes shouldn’t be that thin. I’m not sure what happened, but it doesn’t sound right. I’m glad you still enjoyed it though!
ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS
I have made this cake 2x within the last 7 days and I am making it again next week -by request. It truly is a delightful cake and so pretty. EVERYONE LOVED THE MASCARPONE FROSTING. Thank you AGAIN Lindsay for another fabulous cake!!!
Awesome! I’m so glad to hear that!
I love this recipe and have made it a few times, with a great response from my guests every time!! I am wondering if you have made the cake layers in advance and wondered how they faired?
I’m so glad to hear that! I usually make it a day ahead of frosting it and it does very well. I think I’ve extended it to 2 days and it’s also been fine. They should also freeze pretty well.
Unfortunately this cake didn’t work and was too raw in the center and starting to burn on the bottom, didn’t rise.
This was my birthday cake so now I won’t have one because it needs to go in the trash. Ouch
I’m sorry to hear that. Are you sure you used baking powder and not baking soda?
The cream and berry filling are both tasty, but the cake itself tastes like water…even with all the sugar in it. Does it have to be 1 full cup of water? Or substitute some with more milk/eggs?
You can certainly try adjusting it, if you’d like. I wouldn’t recommend more eggs. You could try milk, but keep in mind that the extra fat will make the cake more dense.
The perfect cake! I just bought your cookbook; arrives Friday! I’m making this for my daughter’s first birthday and will be making the regular sized cake in addition to two 4 inch pans… any idea how much additional batter I should make? Is it about 1/4 more of the recipe?
Awesome! I hope you enjoy the cookbook!
For a 6 inch cake, I normally cut the recipe in half. For 4 inch pans, you could probably do 1/4 of the recipe. I hope you enjoy it!
Thank you!!
My cakes didn’t rise. Just like others have mentioned, they came out dense and underneath looking undercooked. The top part tastes very good, like a cat’s tongue biscuit. I think the problem is too much water not enough eggs. I would omit the water and bake with 4 eggs. Also, it should be noted that the oven should be on convection at 350 or 375 regular. The berry filling has too much corn starch and you can taste it.. you’re better off reducing the corn starch by half and letting the liquid evaporate a little longer. I also added a squeeze of lemon juice when it was done to bring out some brightness .. makes the berry flavour stand out more. Whipped cream with mascarpone cheese worked out well and stable.
I have to say, I have received plenty of comments about the cake having issues, but have never been able to recreate the issue. I’ve tried different ovens, I’ve asked friends from different parts of the country to test it. Nobody can recreate this issue. I say this because I genuinely want to help, but can’t troubleshoot a problem I can’t recreate it. I’ve been wondering – is there any chance you used baking SODA and not baking POWDER? Because they would give you a completely different result and baking SODA would probably turn out like you describe. Any chance you did that by mistake?
And my oven is almost never on convection when I bake. It’s a convection oven, but I use the BAKE setting.
Hi I have a question on the frosting when I added the mascarpone it turned into peaks when I added the 2nd 8 oz of mascarpone it turned into liquid and followed the instructions for it said 16 oz of the mascarpone need advice. Thank you
It sounds like you added mascarpone cheese in two parts instead of adding it all at once. Mascarpone cheese becomes watery if it’s over mixed. If you added some and whipped it a good bit before adding the rest, the first batch of mascarpone cheese that was added could have become over whipped and become watery. You also want to make sure you use it when it is still cold or cool, not room temperature or warmer. That can also cause it to become watery.