White Vanilla cake layers

• Preheat oven to 350°F. Prepare three 8-inch cake pans and three 6-inch round pans with baker's floured cooking spray, or grease and line with parchment rounds.
• Mix together all dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt) in a mixing bowl (or stand mixer with a paddle) until fully combined. Mix chunks of room-temperature butter slowly into the dry mix, on a low speed. Continue to mix until no large chunks of butter remain, and the mixture looks crumbly.
• Pour in eggs and mix on low until just incorporated. Mix in the buttermilk in two parts, on a low speed. Add in vanilla and oil, and mix on low until fully incorporated. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula, then beat on medium speed for about 30 seconds.
• Divide batter evenly between prepared pans. (I recommend using a measuring cup or kitchen scale to keep the batter amounts even. I added 650 grams of batter to my 8” pans, and 325-350 grams in each of my smaller pans. Measuring the batter guarantees your layers will bake to be the same height.)
• Bake for 34-37 minutes, (or until toothpicks comes out clean). Allow cake layers to cool for 10-15 minutes on a wire cooling rack before removing from pans.
• Regardless of what cake flavors / sizes you make - cool *completely* before frosting. Set in the fridge or freezer to accelerate the cooling process if desired. (This is a great time to make your frosting.)
• Once the layers have fully cooled, they can be leveled and any caramelized bits can be trimmed from the sides / top of the cake using a serrated knife if desired. (Be sure the layers are completely cooled / chilled first; if cut while still warm they tend to crumble or break.)

Cream Cheese Buttercream Frosting

• Beat together softened cream cheese and butter; slowly add in powdered sugar alternating with vanilla and whitener until frosting is even and lightened. Decease beater or mixer speed to low. Add whipping cream if needed for a thinner consistency, and beat until well combined.

Assembly + Doweling & Stacking the tiers

• Crumb coat + frost both cake tiers - see this post if you need any help at this step!
• Here's a post and the 1-minute video guide I made on stacking cake tiers - once the cake tiers are frosted, stacking them is actually really simple!
• With 4 straws cut to the base cake tier height and one taller straw, position and press the straws down into the base tier just over one inch from the cake edge, placing them evenly at quarter intervals around the cake. Place your last, tallest straw or dowel into the exact center of the cake, making sure to keep it straight up as you press down.
• Now you’re ready – center the hole in the bottom of your top tier cake circle over the tallest dowel and let the top tier gently down onto the base tier. The dowel will poke into the center of the top tier to hold it in place. (Super helpful for transport!)

Decorating

• Now the fun part - alll the fancy piping! See the attached video and/or numbered gray buttons above if you need more detail on any of these steps - for the sake of space (if you choose to print this recipe card) I'll be a bit more brief here.

(2) Mark and pipe the bottom swags (small star tip)

• With a ruler, parchment round creased in 8 sections, or cup, mark 8 half circles about an inch below the top of each cake tier. (for a frosted 8-inch tier the half circles should be about 3.1 inches; for a frosted 6-inch tier the half circles should be about 2.4 inches.
• With a small star tip, pipe swags in a close up/down zig-zag pattern, making the swag a touch wider at the center (base) than at the top. Repeat around the diameter of both tiers, following your guide lines.

(3) Pipe 2 ‘ruffley’ swags (petal tip)

• With a petal or flat basketweave tip, pipe two more swags above the bottom one, moving the piping tip up/down and in/out just a bit to accentuate the ruffled look. Repeat around the diameter of both tiers, using the bottom swag as a guide.

(4) Large borders (base/middle/top; large french star tip)

• With a large French star (close-ridged) tip, pipe a large 'scalloped' border around the base, between tiers, and around the top of the cake. Piping this in a continuous motion didn't work well for me; I found piping one scallop at a time to be easier.

(5) Small border (middle/top) with small star tip

• Almost done with the piping-tip-switching; I promise. With a small star tip, pipe a small 'looped' border around the top edge of the base tier and the top tier (just below the larger scalloped border).

(6) Teardrops at the top of each swag (small star tip)

• With the same small star tip, pipe a 'teardrop' shape between each swag. Place the piping tip against the swag and pipe until a large ‘drop’ shape forms. Gently pull upwards and away from the cake, leaving a ‘teardrop’ shape.

(7) Small rosette at the top of each teardrop (small star tip)

• Almost done! With the same star tip, pipe a small swirl (rosette) of frosting at the top of each teardrop shape (above the swags).

(8) Flower + sugar pearl designs in the open spaces (small round tip)

• Last step! These small designs help fill the remaining open space on the cake. With a small round tip, pipe a 3-petal design (one in the center and one to the right and left). Add a sugar pearl in the center of the petal design. Repeat around both tiers, staggering if needed depending on the cake height.

And you're done! Congratulations on your killer awesome cake!!