Chantilly Cake topped with fresh berries is a dreamy, showstopping dessert perfect for the holidays and other get-togethers or celebrations!
For more delicious Cake Recipes, be sure to try our Strawberry Bundt Cake and Ultimate Jam Carrot Cake next.
Sabrina’s Chantilly Cake Recipe
Making Berry Chantilly Cake is perfect for special occasions because while it looks impressive on your cake table, it’s not much harder to make than a classic Vanilla Cake. You’ll use a simple cake batter to make moist vanilla cake layers. But what sets this airy cake recipe apart is the unique frosting. This cake is everything you need to make a celebration complete. With the sweetness of the Chantilly frosting and the airy vanilla cake, this combo will be a dessert your family and friends will ask for over and over again!
Recipe Card
Ingredients
Vanilla Cake:
- 3/4 cup unsalted butter
- 1 1/3 cups sugar
- 3 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 cup whole milk , room temperature
- 2 1/4 cups flour
- 2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Simple Syrup:
- 2 cups water
- 3/4 cup sugar
Chantilly Cream Frosting:
- 24 ounces cream cheese , softened
- 12 ounces mascarpone , softened
- 4 1/2 cups powdered sugar
- 3 cups heavy cream
- 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 ½ teaspoons almond extract
Berry Mixture:
- 1 1/2 cups strawberries , chopped
- 1 cup blueberries , halved
- 1 cup raspberries
- 1 cup blackberries
Instructions
Vanilla Cake:
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and butter and flour two 8 inch cake pans.
- Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt then set aside.
- To your stand mixer add the butter and sugar and beat them together until light and fluffy on medium speed, 2-3 minutes, then add in the eggs one at a time 15 seconds apart along with the vanilla then lower the speed to low. Add the flour mixture and milk, alternating a little of each at a time.
- Pour into the cake pans evenly and baked for 25-30 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean.
- Cool cakes completely before frosting.
Simple Syrup:
- Add water and sugar to a saucepan, bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer on medium-low heat.
- Let simmer for 18-20 minutes until thickened and reduced to a syrup.
- Let cool.
Chantilly Cream Frosting:
- Add the cream cheese, mascarpone and powdered sugar to your stand mixer at medium speed for 1 minutes until stiff peaks form. Remove from stand mixer and set aside.
- Add the heavy cream, the vanilla extract and the almond extract to the stand mixer and beat on high speed until soft peaks form.
- Add in the mascarpone mixture and beat on medium speed until creamy, 1-2 minutes.
To Finish:
- To your cake stand add a spoonful of chantilly cream frosting.
- Level the cakes with a large serrated knife and discard the cake pieces.
- Cut each layer of the cake into two pieces through the middle horizontally so you have four thin cake layers.
- Brush off excess crumbs.
- Brush the simple syrup onto the top of each cake layer.
- Add the first layer of the cake to the cake stand.
- Top with 1 cup of chantilly cream frosting, spread evenly.
- Top with a mixture of berries.
- Top with the second layer of cake, add 1 cup of frosting, spread. Add ½ cup of berries and top with the third and fourth layers.
- Brush with simple syrup.
- Frost the cake with half the remaining chantilly cream frosting.
- Pipe swirly mounds onto the top of the cake.
Nutrition
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Table of contents
About this Recipe
This is a classic Southern recipe, similar to a Yellow Cake. One of the secrets to its amazing flavor is brushing simple syrup over the cake layers. The sweet syrup seeps into each layer of cake, creating a more sweet and moist cake. Then top that amazing sweet cake off with Chantilly cream, fresh strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries. The fresh fruit against white cream makes the cake look as good as it tastes. It’s the perfect cake for a special occasion. The combination of sweet chantilly cream, mascarpone, and cream cheese makes a wonderful, tangy, and sweet frosting with an unbelievably fluffy texture. The Chantilly frosting definitely sets this dessert apart. Then you’ll finish the cake with plenty of juicy berries for the perfect decoration and flavor addition.
Ingredients
- Butter: Before starting the recipe, bring the unsalted butter to room temperature. The softened butter creams perfectly with the granulated sugar to make a light, fluffy base for the cake batter. It makes the cake light with a moist crumb.
- Flour: To keep your cake from turning out dense, use cake flour instead of all-purpose flour. Cake flour is lighter and has less protein and gluten. This stops the cake from becoming too dense or chewy. Sift the 2 ¼ cups cake flour with the other dry ingredients for a light and airy flour mixture.
- Simple syrup: If you have ready-made simple syrup, you can use it for this recipe. However, it’s easy to make yourself by combining water and sugar and cooking them down into a reduced, syrupy mix.
- Cheese mixture: For the softened cream cheese frosting, you’ll use a combination of cream cheese and mascarpone. Adding mascarpone to the cream cheese makes a more mild, airy, and smooth frosting. Be sure to bring the cheese to room temperature before using it.
- Powdered sugar: To make the chantilly cream, you’ll combine the heavy cream with powdered sugar. This sweetened cream recipe uses more sugar than standard whipped cream. But you’ll still whip the two ingredients together the same as you would for classic whipped cream.
- Berry mixture: The fresh fruit is the perfect finishing touch for this delicious cake. You can use any kind of fruit you like, but traditionally you’ll want sliced strawberries, fresh blueberries, fresh raspberries, and blackberries. Add the fresh berries between the cake layers and over the entire cake to finish the recipe with bright colors and a refreshing, sweet flavor.
Can this be made ahead of time?
Because of the light cream frosting, your Cake won’t keep as well as other baked goods. But, if you want to make it a day in advance, you can carefully cover it in plastic wrap to store in the fridge. Just don’t try to make it more than a day or two in advance, or the Chantilly Cream can make the cake soggy.
How to Store
Store: To keep your Chantilly Cake fresh, cover it with plastic wrap or store it in an airtight container. Refrigerate it for up to 3-4 days. The airtight seal prevents the cake from drying out and helps maintain its moisture and flavor.
Freeze: It’s not recommended that the cake recipe be frozen after you add the Chantilly frosting. But, if you make the vanilla cake in advance, you can carefully wrap the cake layers in plastic wrap followed by tin foil and place them in a freezer bag. Frozen cakes can stay good for up to 3 months.
Frequent Questions
Mascarpone is a soft Italian cream cheese. If you don’t have mascarpone to make the mascarpone frosting, the closest substitute that you could use is crème fraîche. They give the same fluffy consistency and lightly tangy flavor.
Although they have most of the same base ingredients, the key difference between Chantilly Cream and whipped cream is that chantilly cream is sweeter. It also frequently has added flavors such as vanilla. In this recipe, I’ve added vanilla as well as almond extract. Then, you’ll mix the chantilly cream with cream cheese and mascarpone frosting to make a fluffy, sweet, and tangy frosting similar to cream cheese frosting.
Yes, due to the Chantilly Cream frosting, this cake recipe needs to be refrigerated to stay fresh.
This cake recipe originated in New Orleans. It’s a traditional dessert recipe throughout the Southern US.
Variations
- Jam Filling: If you prefer, you can swap out the cream filling in the original recipe for a fruit jam filling. Spread strawberry or raspberry jam over the first cake layer (you can also add the fresh berries over the top). Then add the next cake layer and a layer of the cream frosting to the rest of the cake as usual.
- Lemon Blueberry Chantilly Cake: Lemon and blueberry are a classic flavor combination perfect for the summer. To bring those flavors into this recipe, you can mix fresh lemon juice into the cake batter and the frosting. Then layer fresh blueberries over the cake frosting, and garnish the top with lemon zest curls.
- Berry Mix-ins: You could also mix berries into the cake batter. Using fresh or frozen berries gives a delicious addition of fruit flavor throughout the cake recipe.
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