This Strawberry Ice Cream Cake is delicious and perfect for spring and summer! The vanilla cake is so soft and light, and the strawberry ice cream is creamy and full of fresh strawberry flavor!
Strawberry Ice Cream Cake
Fruit is kind of like nature’s art. I mean think about it. Fruit, for the most part, is beautiful. It’s so colorful. It comes in so many shapes and sizes. You can file it onto a cake and call it decorated. Beautiful.
Plus, it delicious. If there’s anything better than outer beauty, it’s inner beauty. And inside most fruit, you find sweet delicious-ness. Double the beautiful.
I’m poetic, I know.
But seriously. I love decorating cakes and sweets with fruit. It’s the easiest way to make a beautiful dessert that just screams fun and life. Fruit makes me happy and so does this Strawberry Ice Cream Cake.
Plus, it’s pink inside.
How to Make This Strawberry Ice Cream Cake
The ice cream base recipe is my favorite to use for ice cream cakes. It requires no ice cream machine and is thick even before freezing, which allows you to stack the ice cream cake without having to freeze the ice cream first, speeding up the process. It’s delicious and people always think it’s store bought ice cream. The main ingredients are cream cheese and whipped cream (I used Cool Whip) and you’d never know it. You can’t taste the cream cheese, but it adds a great creaminess.
The cake layers are made first, then the ice cream, then it’s all stacked together and frozen.
You’ll want to bake the cakes in 8 inch pans. If you have a springform pan, that’d be helpful. I don’t, so I use regular 8×3 inch pans. When it’s time to put everything together, I use the same 8×3 inch pan so that I have taller sides. I line the pan first with clear wrap that extends up the sides of the pan, which is used to lift the cake out of the pan once it’s frozen.
Then add a cardboard cake circle for the cake to rest on and wrap parchment paper around the inside edges of the pan, which also extend 1-2 inches above the top edge of the pan. The fully cake will be taller than the pan, so the parchment paper extends the sides of the pan, allowing you to stack the cake.
Place the first layer of cake in the pan. Then, before adding the ice cream, place thin slices of strawberries around the outer edge of the cake. They should be standing up and resting on the sides of the cake pan. They should line up with the first/bottom layer of cake you just added. Once that’s done, spoon the ice cream onto the cake and spread into an even layer, keeping the strawberries in place. Top the ice cream with the second layer of cake and freeze it. I usually leave it overnight.
Once it’s frozen, use the clear wrap to lift it out of the pan and place it on your cake plate. Top it with whipped cream (homemade or Cool Whip) and top it off with strawberries. You can just pile them on, or make them into kind of a strawberry flower like I did. Nature’s art, I tell you. 😉 I started with the outside circle of strawberry slices and worked my way in the to center.
This cake is seriously to die for. The cake is soft and delicious and the ice cream is so creamy and full of strawberry flavor.
To give the ice cream that great strawberry flavor, I actually used some homemade strawberry pie filling. It’s made on the stove prior to adding to the ice cream base. I tried to make the ice cream without the extra step of making the pie filling, but if you use straight strawberry puree, you get an ice-y ice cream and you don’t want that. Not as tasty. But done the right way, this ice cream is so creamy and irresistible. Hard to put the fork down and walk away.
So if you love strawberry, like I do, and you want to make tasty nature art, be sure to make this beautiful and fun Strawberry Ice Cream Cake. 😉
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Strawberry Ice Cream Cake
- Prep Time: 4 hours
- Cook Time: 21 minutes
- Total Time: 4 hours 21 minutes
- Yield: 12-14 Servings
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: American
Description
This Strawberry Ice Cream Cake is delicious and perfect for spring and summer! The vanilla cake is so soft and light, and the strawberry ice cream is creamy and full of fresh strawberry flavor!
Ingredients
CAKE LAYERS
- 1 2/3 cups all purpose flour
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 3/4 cup butter, room temperature
- 3 egg whites
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1/2 cup milk
STRAWBERRY PIE FILLING
- 1/2 cup strawberry puree
- 2 1/2 tbsp water
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
ICE CREAM
- 8 oz cream cheese, room temperature
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 2 tbsp milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp strawberry extract
- 1/2 cup homemade strawberry pie filling, recipe above
- 8 oz Cool Whip (or homemade whipped cream)
- 2–4 drops red food color
- strawberry slices, for edge
TOPPING
- 4 oz of Cool Whip
- strawberry slices
Instructions
MAKE THE CAKE LAYERS:
ONCE CAKE HAS COOLED, MAKE THE STRAWBERRY PIE FILLING AND ICE CREAM:
ASSEMBLING IT ALL:
Notes
- You’ll need one full 16 oz package of strawberries. You could need a second package, depending on the number of strawberries and sizes. If you want to make sure you have nice looking strawberries for the sides and top, I’d recommend a second package so that you can pick and choose the nicest ones.
- An 8-inch springform pan is best for this recipe so that you can easily remove the cake once it’s been assembled. If you do not have a springform pan, line your pan with clear wrap before adding your parchment paper and cake board. You can use the clear warp to lift your cake out of the pan once it’s assembled and frozen.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Slice
- Calories: 334
- Sugar: 39.9 g
- Sodium: 182.8 mg
- Fat: 12.8 g
- Carbohydrates: 51.2 g
- Protein: 5.8 g
- Cholesterol: 13.8 mg
Keywords: strawberry dessert recipe, strawberry dessert, strawberry ice cream cake, strawberry cake recipe, strawberry cake filling, homemade strawberry cake, strawberry cake from scratch, easy strawberry cake, strawberry ice cream recipe, homemade strawberry ice cream
Filed Under:
Enjoy!
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Can’t wait to try this out for daughters birthday party! The question I have though is am I making my own strawberry puree? Or is that something I’m buying from the store? Thanks for the amazing recipe!
You’ll make your own. You should get about 1/2 cup of puree from about 1 cup of quartered strawberries. I hope you enjoy it!
If I double the recipe, what size cake pan should I use?
I’m not sure, since I haven’t done it. Maybe a 10 inch?
I love the presentation of this! When you freeze the cake after assembling, do you cover the top of the cake to prevent ice crystals from forming on it overnight?
I don’t. I don’t usually have a problem with that happening so quickly.
I made this cake for my daughter’s birthday as she specifically requested a “strawberry ice cream cake.” It was delicious and everyone loved it. I decided to use a conversion chart to make a larger cake because I only had 10” springform pans. I just multiplied everything by 1.5 and it worked really well. I would also add that it needed to thaw for about 1.5 – 2 hours on the countertop before it was easy to cut and eat. The ice cream didn’t thaw too much during that time because it is sandwiched between the layers of frozen cake. Just be forewarned, 30 mins is definitely not long enough!
★★★★★
made it twice for friends’ birthdays and people were impressed! cake itself is delicious and ice cream complements it well. only thing is the cake part is a bit too frozen for me since the whole thing needs to be frozen for ages. not a big deal though I just have to thaw my piece for a little longer
★★★★★
I’m glad everyone has enjoyed it!
The completely finished cake can be frozen 3-5 days ?
It can be frozen for longer if well covered, but if it’s decorated it’s going to look freshest the sooner it’s served. 3-5 days is the most I’d recommend for it to look nice.
Hi, thanks for posting this recipe! Just wondering if you think it’d be fine to make this cake tomorrow, freeze it, and serve on Sunday afternoon?
Sorry for the delay, but for future, the cake can be made and frozen ahead for sure.
Hi Lindsay! If the cake is sitting in the freezer until it’s ready to serve, won’t the sponge cake part be frozen? How do you make sure the cake part isn’t frozen, but the ice cream is?
Yes, the cake will be frozen as well, just like any ice cream cake. You can let it sit out for 15 minutes or so before cutting and it’ll be fine.
Been thinking same thing! My idea is to try assembling ice cream in same springform pan the cake was baked in and freezing it. Then assembling the frozen ice cream part on to the fresh cake parts before serving. Hmm. Hard cake takes the fun away!