July 11, 2018
Neapolitan Cake!
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Chocolate cake, strawberry cake, and vanilla cake with all the trimmings… perfect Neapolitan cake!
Neapolitan cake!
So… the Neapolitan theme is definitely one of my favourites. If you aren’t aware of it, its basically an ice-cream from my childhood that I remember it best by, with chocolate, strawberry and vanilla all in one. It’s SO good, but everyone I knew I always had a favourite flavour. Mine was Chocolate, obviously.
I’ve posted a couple of Neapolitan recipes before with my Neapolitan cheesecake and my Neapolitan cupcakes for example, so I thought it was about time I did another one, and I thought a full layer cake was the best route to go. You can see from the images that its a showstopper of a cake, and has a layer that everyone will love most!
Sponges
You can see from my photos that my sponges have been trimmed, and thats partly because my oven is a bit shocking lately (hello randomly burning everything ever), and because I really wanted the bright pink to be on show. This is an optional thing, and I preferably would have left the sponges alone… but alas.
The cake sponges are basically just a Victoria sponge type recipe that I have used in many a recipe such as my Oreo drip cake, or even Biscoff cake for example. A simple ratio recipe of the same weight of butter, sugar, flour and eggs and you have a dreamer of a cake.
Strawberry and chocolate layers
You can obviously add various things in such as all of the flavours. For this particular beauty, I decided to used melted chocolate for the chocolate flavour, so that I didn’t have to add any more dry ingredients such as cocoa powder. If you add the cocoa powder into the third of the sponge, it will end up more madeira like, and the other two sponges will be a lot softer.
Dark chocolate is the best chocolate to use, and any supermarket own brand will do well! The strawberry layer is a bit different, where you can easily use strawberry flavouring if you prefer, or use the strawberry coulis. It’s quite easy to make your own strawberry coulis by using 300g of strawberries and 100g of caster sugar.
Coulis
To make the coulis all you have to do is chop the the strawberries into quarters and remove the tops, add the strawberries in to a pan with the sugar and heat on a medium heat – mash the fruit with a fork and heat and stir until the sugar has dissolved and the fruit has become saucy. Pass the mixture through a sieve into a bowl and bin the mushy bits that are left – refrigerate until needed.
Vanilla layer
The final layer is vanilla, so obviously that is quite simple. Add in a good quality vanilla extract, and you’ll have your final layer. The buttercream, flavours are flavoured in the same ways to make things easier. You don’t have to use the pink food colouring, but I think it makes it look properly Neapolitan themed. A good quality one is best, so I recommend Colourmill pink!
Neapolitan Cake!
Ingredients
Cake Ingredients
- 400 g unsalted butter
- 400 g caster sugar
- 8 medium eggs
- 400 g self raising flour
- 100 g dark chocolate (melted)
- 50 g strawberry coulis (or any coulis)
- Pink food colouring
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Buttercream Ingredients
- 300 g unsalted butter (room temp)
- 600 g icing sugar
- 50 g melted chocolate
- 25 g strawberry coulis
- Pink food colouring
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Decoration
- Fresh strawberries
- Pieces of chocolate
Instructions
For the Cake!
- Preheat your oven to 180C/160C Fan, and line three 8"/20cm round cake tins with parchment paper. Leave to the side for now.
- In a bowl/stand mixer, add your butter and sugar, and beat until fluffy.
- Add in the eggs and flour, and beat again. Split the mixture into three bowls. It will be about 525g in each bowl to make sure its even.
- Add some cooled melted chocolate to one, and mix. Add the coulis and pink food colouring to the other, and mix. And add the vanilla to the final one and mix.
- Pour each mix into its own tin, and bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes, or until its baked. A skewer should come out clean!
For the Buttercream!
- Beat the unsalted butter (please don't use anything else other than actual unsalted butter) in a bowl until its all smooth. Room temperature butter is best.
- Add in the icing sugar and beat again. If the butter was really supple and smooth before adding, this icing sugar should go in easily.
- Split the mixture between three bowls, and add the cooled melted chocolate to one, the coulis and pink food colouring to another, and the vanilla to the final and beat again until smooth!
For the Decoration!
- Put each buttercream into a bag. Do this in whatever order you like, but I did my chocolate layer, and then my chocolate buttercream, strawberry layer and then my strawberry buttercream, my vanilla layer, and then the vanilla buttercream on top!
- With each layer, I just blobbed it on as you can see.
- Once each layer is added on, I used the leftover buttercream to add some extra height and decoration to the cake.
- Decorate with fresh strawberries, pieces of chocolate, or whatever!
Notes
- This recipe will last for 3 days once made
- I used Colourmill pink food colouring to get a lovely pink colour, and some strawberry coulis. You can use any red berry coulis if you don't want to make it yourself! It's very important to use GOOD QUALITY food colouring, and not cheap supermarket stuff.
- I used dark chocolate because its a better flavour once baked in comparison to milk chocolate. It also gets the colour of the sponge to be darker and look more chocolate like.
- You can make a smaller version (two layer) if you like, but obviously you might have to make the sponges swirled in colour if there are only two. Use two thirds of the ingredients and:
- 300g unsalted butter
- 300g caster sugar
- 6 medium eggs
- 300g self raising flour
- 75g melted chocolate
- 40g coulis
- I had to trim my sponges down because my oven is a bit off at the moment, but it also showed the pink colour better as coloured sponges can often still look brown on the outside. This is normal.
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J x
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Hi any tips on trimming the cake sides please, would it help to be frozen?
I have made this before but I did it all strawberry sponges worked out great. I want to make it 4 layers not 3 next time, what measures will I use?
Hi, can I use strawberry jam instead of Coulis for the strawberry sponge?
Hello, yes it is worth a go xx
Hi.
Made this twice and both times the buttercream is like a rock. It broke my bags (first time I figured it was a fluke but it happened again).
Any ideas why? I’ve made it in both summer and winter so the butter shouldn’t have been cold. I followed the recipe exactly but I just have to plop it on rather than icing it on (although I’m not great at that either 😔😂)
Thanks for any help 🙂
It may just need a little boiling water added to it to soften it slightly – or a bit more beating! x
Hi
Made this once before and it was lush. I am thinking about making it boozy (adding flavoured vodka/baileys etc) to just the buttercreams. Do you have any idea how much should be added?
Don’t want to knock anyone out! Thanks 😀
Adding any liquid can definitely soften and slacken buttercreams so you don’t want to add much – It’s probably best to only add 1tbsp of each at a time and beat really well so you don’t add too much (but the flavours may not come through that strongly) x
Great recipe, great cake
Made this for my hubby’s birthday…. Had to trim the sides as the colour wasn’t really visable until the cake was cut into… Glad I did this… As it really looked neapolitan!
Struggled with the chocolate icing followed the recipe but the icing was really clagy…. Not sure why? Other layers were great….
Even made my own strawberry coulis definitely do this again myself didn’t realise how easy it was to do….. Thanks
I find if a buttercream is a little claggy that adding about 1-2tbsp of boiling water or full-fat milk smooths it out perfect!! And it really is isn’t it!! x
I tried to make the cupcake versions but the strawberry butter icing went really runny even though I used all the ingredients you said and it wasn’t a particularly hot day either so that wouldn’t have effected either. Any ideas?
What type of butter did you use?
Block in a foil wrapper, like you use for all.your recipe’s lol
I ask as some can still be too soft (such as stork block, that isn’t nearly as firm as supermarket own unsalted). It may be that the butter was too softened even though the temperature of the day wasn’t too bad, or the coulis you used is too runny x
Hi sorry if I missed this but do you use milk or dark chocolate for the buttercream?
Thanks
You can use either! x
I’m thinking of making this for a friends birthday but want to cover the sides. How much butter cream would I need and ingredients to create that amount. Loving your recipes! Thank you!
I would probably double it just to be safe! x
Can you use strawberry jam instead of making coulis.
If so how much would you need.
Thanks
I would use about the same! x
I was wondering how the jam turned out? Pondering whether to make the coulis or just buy jam.
Hi Jane, im making this for my Mother in-Laws birthday, could i cover the edges in buttercream and kind of blend them like you do in your triple chocolate cake ? Or would that look wrong? My sponges never look perfect so i usually use my buttercream to hide this 🙈🤣 thanks xx
Hey!! Yes, you definitely can! I have done this myself, I just haven’t posted it on here yet!! xx
What size cake pans should I use for this?
All cake tin measurements are written in the methods of my recipes ☺️
HI Jane
I had being making your recipes for so long they are all amazing 🥰. I am making this for my friend but when wants the outside covered in just the vanilla buttercream and smudges of the other colours…..I was just wondering if you could help on how much extra of the vanilla to make to do a crumb coat and a generous coating outside xxx
I would add on maybe another 100g butter/200g sugar to be comfortable! x
Hi! Does this recipe need baking powder? X
It doesn’t – but feel free to add a little if you want. x
Hi I want to make this for my daughters first birthday so I want to get it perfect! This is a stupid question but I think this is my downfall in baking .. when you beat eggs and sugar untill fluffy roughly how long with an electric whisk would that be? As I feel sometimes I over beat or under beat and the cake doesn’t always come out as spongy and moist as it should ?
Thank you
I tend to use my kitchenaid with the paddle attachment – and usually maybe 1-2 minutes? If it’s not as moist just reduce the baking time by a couple of minutes xx
Did you make your own strawberry coulis? Or where can I buy? Thanks
I made my own – the recipe is in the post!
Hello 😊 whenever i make a 3 tier cake the sponges come out very thin, what am i doing wrong? Xx
If you use the wrong size tins it can make a drastic change to the depth, and also if the mix sits for a bit before baking that can cause a problem etc. There are many reasons why to be honest! These sponges are only about 1.25” thick! X
Would this work in 7” pans to make the layers thicker..? Or how much more would
You add to make them
Thicker in 8” pans?
This cake is already about 6-7 inches tall so making them thicker would make it dangerously tall *unless you skewer them*. You can bake them in 7″ though if you did want it taller.
There’s no liquid in this cake? Milk, water, buttermilk?
No, as its a standard cake recipe? It doesn’t need any other ingredients.
Thank you!
Would this cake need to be kept in the fridge?
Nope! Room temp is the perfect place.
Hi Jane, for the strawberry cake layer and strawberry buttercream – can i use foodie drops instead of coulis?
Yes you can indeed!
Thank you Jane. But do you know roughly how much drops to put into cake batter and buttercream?
Probably 3/4tsp in the cake, and 1/2tsp worth in the buttercream xx
Neapolitan cake… What a fab idea! It was my fave ice cream dessert when I was a child too. Yet to try the Baileys Strawberry truffles (can’t wait) –
I wanted to make some strawberry truffles for a child’s party but would have to omit the Baileys- is there something else I could flavour them with (strawberry). I had a look in the supermarket but couldn’t find anything strawberry flavoured. Thanks!
Thank you! You could try the coulis maybe? I’m not sure on how much you would need, but maybe try 85ml double cream, and 35ml of coulis? I’m not sure how it would set but as long as you don’t add too much it should be fine!