Moist Red Velvet Marble Cake recipe makes a marble cake that looks as good as it tastes. Plus, get tips for making the perfect marble cake swirls.
Red velvet is one of those cakes that I have trouble passing up. This cake, though, is a bit different than the normal red velvet layer cake.
It’s a red velvet cake meets a pound cake, and the resulting marble cake is dense, rich, and delicious!
The marbling technique for making the swirls is easy, and it gives you a great effect without the risk of blending the batters together.
It’s a perfect Valentine’s Day or Christmas dessert. However, this cake would be just as at home any other time of the year.
Ingredients and substitutions
- Cake flour – Cake flour helps to give the cake its tender crumb. If you don’t have cake flour, you can make a substitute with this recipe.
- Butter – I use salted butter. If using unsalted butter, increase the salt by 1/2 teaspoon.
- Sour cream – Full-fat sour cream, whole milk Greek yogurt, 2% Greek yogurt, or plain nonfat Greek yogurt will all work.
- Milk – I recommend using 2% or whole milk. The fat helps to make the cake moist.
- Unsweetened cocoa powder – I suggest using unsweetened cocoa powder rather than Dutch-processed because it lets more of the red color come through on the swirl.
- Red food color – Or red food coloring paste.
How to make red velvet marble cake
Step 1: Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a 10-15-cup bundt pan.
Step 2: In a medium bowl, whisk together cake flour, baking powder, and salt.
Step 3: In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat together butter, sugar, and sour cream until well-combined. Stir in vanilla until combined.
Step 4: Add eggs one at time, mixing well after each addition.
Step 5: On low, stir in flour mixture until just incorporated. Stir in milk until combined.
Step 6: In a separate large bowl, stir together 2 ½ cups of the batter, cocoa powder, milk, and red food coloring until well-combined.
Step 7: Using a ¼-cup measuring cup, drop two scoops of plain batter into prepared bundt pan. Drop one scoop of red velvet swirl batter on top of plain batter.
Step 8: Continue to alternate between plain and red velvet swirl batters until both batters are gone.
Step 9: Bake for 50-60 minutes, or until a wooden toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
Step 10: Cool cake in the pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes. Invert the cake onto wire rack, and cool completely.
Step 11: Dust cooled cake with powdered sugar, if desired.
Recipe Tips!
- Moist cake: Fat helps to make cakes moist. I recommend using full-fat sour cream and whole milk for the moistest cake.
- Preparing the pan: It’s important to properly grease and flour the bundt pan so that the cake will come out of the pan easily. Pan release works well this.
- Freezing: This cake freezes well. You can either bake the cake, let it cool to room temperature, and then wrap tightly in plastic wrap and freeze, or you can cut slices of the baked and cooled cake and wrap them tightly in plastic wrap and freeze.
Recipe FAQs
A marble cake is a cake that has a light and a dark batter swirled together. Chocolate and vanilla are the most common pairing, but this cake swirls red velvet and vanilla cake batters together.
Traditionally, cake batters are swirled together with a knife. The trouble with that method is that it’s easy to over-swirl and end up with muddied swirls.
With this method, the different batters are layered on top of each other. This helps to preserve each batter and gives the cake its nicely defined swirls.
Storage
This cake should be stored in an airtight container. It will keep for 3-4 days at room temperature.
More red velvet recipes!
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Red Velvet Marble Cake Recipe
Equipment
- Bundt Pan
Ingredients
- 3 cups cake flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup butter at room temperature
- 2 ½ cups granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 5 large eggs
- 1/2 cup milk
Red Velvet Swirl
- 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 5 tablespoons milk
- 1 tablespoons red food color
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a 10-15-cup bundt pan.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together cake flour, baking powder, and salt.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat together butter, sugar, and sour cream until well-combined.
- Stir in vanilla until combined.
- Add eggs one at time, mixing well after each addition.
- On low, stir in flour mixture until just incorporated.
- Stir in milk until combined.
- In a separate large bowl, stir together 2 ½ cups of the batter, cocoa powder, milk, and red food coloring until well-combined.
- Using a 1/4-cup measuring cup, drop two scoops of plain batter into prepared bundt pan.
- Drop one scoop of red velvet swirl batter on top of plain batter.
- Continue to alternate between plain and red velvet swirl batters until both batters are gone.
- Bake for 50-60 minutes, or until a wooden toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Cool cake in the pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes.
- Invert the cake onto wire rack, and cool completely.
Video
Notes
- Cake flour – Cake flour helps to give the cake its tender crumb. If you don’t have cake flour, you can make a substitute with this recipe.
- Butter – I use salted butter. If using unsalted butter, increase the salt by 1/2 teaspoon.
- Sour cream – Full-fat sour cream, whole milk Greek yogurt, 2% yogurt, or plain nonfat Greek yogurt will all work.
- Milk – I recommend using 2% or whole milk. The fat helps to make the cake moist.
- Unsweetened cocoa powder – I suggest using unsweetened cocoa powder rather than Dutch-processed because it lets more of the red color come through on the swirl.
- Nutrition values are estimates.
Nutrition
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Originally published 1/15/2016.
Reader Interactions
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Comments & Reviews
Antoinette Lindesay says
Hello,
I’m loving your recipes and can’t wait to try this one. Unfortunately I don’t have a stand mixer. I recently bought a food processor with various attachment and I have a hand mixer. Would either of these do the job?
Kate says
Hi! Thank you so much! Your food processor may work just fine! If not, your hand mixer should work. You may find that you need to mix in the flour by hand to avoid burning out your mixer, but, otherwise, it should work!
Shay says
Wow, it’s a beautiful cake and tastes as good as it looks. Thanks for the recipe.
Kate says
Thank you!
genesis says
do i use salted or unsalted butter?
Kate says
I use salted butter. If you prefer to use unsalted butter, you can. Just increase the salt by about 1/4 teaspoon.
Muriel says
This recipe was so easy to follow and make. It was moist, and flush not too sweet. My go to recipe!
Kate says
Thank you!!
Dolores Vadillo says
Can you make this recipe in a loaf pan
Kate says
I haven’t tried making it in a loaf pan to say for certain. I think you would need to either halve the recipe or use two loaf pans because there will be more batter than will fit in a loaf pan.
Smin says
hey!! i’m gonna try making this in a loaf pan and was wondering how yours turned out! make size do you use?
Sondra says
Hi. I want to make this for my daughter’s birthday and use half sheet pan, donI double the recipe for this?
Thank you
Kate says
Hi – I don’t have an exact answer for you on this one. A standard sheet pan takes approx. 14 cups of batter. I haven’t measured out the cups of batter in this recipe to say exactly how many cups it will make, but a standard bundt pan holds approx. 10-12 cups of batter. Hope that helps!
Amber Orosco says
Hello! Could this be made as mini loafs? I have a mini loaf pan from Wilton that almost looks like a cupcake pan, but of course with rectangles instead of circles! So, very small loaves! Besides the bake time, I just wasn’t sure if such a small size would effect the end result. Thanks!
Kate says
I haven’t tried baking them as loaves to say for certain, but I think it could work. I’d love to hear how it turns out if you try it!
Cooking with the Chase's says
I made this wonderful amazing cake today and it was a HIT grandchildren loved it , will make again & again.
Kate says
Thanks! So glad to hear that!
Ann says
After all the batter is in the pan do you smooth it out with a spatula? I don’t think you do?
Kate says
Hi! If the batter ends up being lopsided at the end, you can give the pan a tap or two to help even it out. I wouldn’t recommend smoothing it with a spatula as that could mix the batter and ruin your swirls.
Yazmin says
5 stars !
Also I forgot to buy greek yogurt and I used sour cream instead. Cake turned out with no issues :)
Kate says
Thank you!
Yaz says
Hi kate, I don’t have a bundt cake pan, do you have any suggestions on what alternative pan I can use for this recipe?
Kate says
Hi! I haven’t tried baking it in any other size pans, but a 9×13 or 2 9-inch round pans would be the closest size-wise. I hope that helps!
Yazmin says
I baked it in the 9 by 13 inch pan and it came out perfectly ! Didn’t have to change the bake time or anything. My twin boys loved this cake and we will be saving this recipe for the future. Thank you ! !
Kate says
I’m so glad that it worked out for you! Thanks for taking the time to come back and share that it worked out! I always wonder how things like that go. =)
Annika says
This is my first attempt at making any sort of bundt cake and the recipe was very nice and not challenging at all. It was very fun to do and I appreciate that it didn’t take up too much food dye. Mine took a little over an hour to bake. I also made a little icing to put on top and it reminded me of my favorite treat at Starbucks! Thank you for sharing this great recipe. :)
Kate says
Congrats on making your first bundt cake! =) I’m glad that the recipe worked well for you and that you liked the cake. Thank you for taking the time to comment!
Alexine says
Great recipe, I made this cake a couple of Christmases ago it was a hit, I’ll be making it for Valentine’s day.
Kate says
Thank you! I’m glad you liked the cake. =) Enjoy!
Cheryl says
Hi do you use unsalted butter since your putting salt in also.
Kate says
Hi! No, I use salted butter. Hope that helps!
Heide says
Just got done making it for Thanksgiving. Looks good. I can’t wait to try it.
Kate says
Thank you! I hope you enjoy the cake! Happy Thanksgiving!
Cuca says
Just love it! Wonderful idea and super tasty
Kate says
Thank you! So glad you liked it! =)
Nadyah says
I love your Red Velvet Marble cake . It’s just wow. I bake almost weekly
Kate says
Thank you so much! I’m so glad that you like the cake. =) Thank you for taking the time to come back and comment!
mona says
i wish i read the. comments before substituting plain yoghurt for greek !!it turned out runny too …so will try it again with greek yoghurt
Kate says
Unfortunately, the two don’t always sub well for each other. I recommend making sure that you stir up the Greek yogurt, too, if it has a lot of liquid at the top. Otherwise, using that liquid at the top will give you a runnier batter, too. Good luck! =)
Nancy says
Fantastic recipe! I made this for a lady’s luncheon. The cake was perfect, and everyone loved it.
Kate says
Thank you! I’m glad that the cake was a hit! Thank you for coming back to comment. =)
Norma says
Triying for the first time. Up to now everything going as described. Smell s wonderfull. Thanks
Kate says
Thank you! Hope you enjoy it! =)
Rudz says
Is self-raising flour and cake flour the same thing?
Kate says
Unfortunately, no. Self-rising flour also has baking powder and salt added in. Cake flour is a lower protein flour that creates a more tender baked good.