Zebra Stripe Cake Technique

If you want to learn the zebra stripe cake technique, you’ve come to the right place! In this tutorial I’ll give you all the tools you need to learn how to add layers of color to the inside of your cake. This is a simple cake but will look like you spent hours preparing it!

Zebra striping is similar to a marble cake, but in a more controlled fashion. When the cake layers are baked, you’ll end up with rings of color. It’s hard to explain what the finished product looks like. You simply have to see it for yourself!

There’s a Surprise Inside of the Cake!

For the sake of this tutorial I’m going to start with a white cake recipe and divide the batter in half. One-half I’ll leave white, 1/4 I’ll color red (with red coloring gel), and 1/4 will be colored blue. I’m going for a patriotic look. (We’re celebrating my great-nephew’s Eagle Scout Court of Honor. When you see the complete cake, it will all make sense!)

To make a triple-layer 8″ cake you’ll need two cake mixes. Here’s what you’ll need to make this recipe:

Zebra Cake Ingredients:

You will find the full printable zebra cake recipe at the bottom of this post. For now, check out this ingredients list!

• white cake mixes: Pillsbury, Betty Crocker, or Duncan Hines (whichever brand you choose)
• egg whites, room temperature (You can add the egg yolks if you’re not worried about making sure your cake is bright white.)
• vegetable oil
• salted butter, room temperature
• water
• milk (room temperature)
• instant vanilla pudding (approximately half of a 5.1 oz box)
• clear vanilla extract
• almond extract

This is a moist cake but you can always add a bit of sour cream to make it even more moist, if you like.

How to Make Your Cake

Start by putting your dry ingredients (the two cake mixes and instant pudding) into a large mixing bowl. If you’re using a stand mixer make sure you bowl is big enough to accommodate both mixes at once. Otherwise, divide these instructions in half.

Add your wet ingredients: room temperature butter, vegetable oil, egg whites, extracts, and half of your water and milk. Mix until incorporated. Slowly work in the rest of your water and milk. Don’t over mix.

How to do the Zebra Stripe Cake Technique

When your batter is thoroughly mixed (but not over-mixed) divide it into three separate bowls (half in the first bowl, 1/4 each in the other two). Color half white, 1/4 red and 1/4 blue. (You can choose any colors you like, actually! I’m thinking lime green, pink, and white would be pretty!)

Set your bowls of cake batter all in a row, within reach. Separate batters call for separate scoops. Have scoops (or measuring cups) handy.

Add a scoop (at least half a cup) of the white batter to the prepared (greased and floured) 8″ cake pan. I find that round pans work best.

Come on top of the center of the vanilla batter with a different color, dropping it directly into the center of the white. (I chose blue.) The pressure from the blue will force a ring of white to form.

Now do another scoop of white batter on top of the blue, dropping it directly into the center. it will force a ring of white to form. (Full disclosure: my batter was a little thick, thanks to the pudding, so the rings didn’t form as evenly as I would have liked.)

Now come on top of the white with a scoop of red.

By now you’ll see multiple rings of color. Repeat the process until you’ve used up all of your batter.

Don’t worry about whatever color you end up with on top of the cake. When the cake is cut you’ll see so much color that you won’t be paying any attention to the details.

When your pans are half-full, bake the cakes at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until the cake springs back to the touch and pulls away from the edges of the pan.

Allow your colorful cakes to cool on a wire rack.

When the cakes are fully cooled, it’s time to level them.

Ordinarily the rings would look more centered, but my thicker batter was working against me. I didn’t mind, though! I just needed these cakes to look patriotic when I cut into them at the event.

Stack and Fill Your Cakes

Time to stack and fill those cakes! I used my Dreamy Buttercream Frosting recipe for this project. It has cream cheese in it, and is totally delicious!

I set one of them on a board, iced the top, and then added a ring of frosting to hold in the sprinkles. (Ordinarily I use a filling but in this case I decided the colorful sprinkles would be enough.)

Continue stacking, turning the top cake upside-down so the cake is perfectly level on top.

It’s time to crumb coat and chill! Once your cakes are done chilling, you can go ahead and decorate them. I thought it would be fun to show you the Eagle Scout decor I went with.

If you’re wondering how I managed to tier this cake, check out my “How to Tier a Cake” post.

I took the cake (and a bunch of other sweet treats) to the venue. Here’s what the table looked like. (A special nod to my granddaughters, who helped me serve!)

The Finished Product!

A colorful zebra layer cake!

Finally, the moment arrived to cut the cake. I was so happy with the red, white, and blue interior!

The guests were so surprised (and the cake was delicious, too)! I especially love the thin layers of red and blue! The striped pattern was delightful.

This isn’t the first time I’ve zebra-striped a cake. Here are a few more pictures from an earlier project, a pretty pink zebra cake. A thinner batter made for thinner layers, which was nice.

Variations on the Zebra Stripe Effect

• It’s particularly fun to do different flavors, like chocolate batter and vanilla batter. (Yum!) The dual-color effect is nice, but so is the flavor combination. If you don’t want to bake two different flavors of cake, just bake vanilla and add cocoa powder to half. Alternate the chocolate cake batter and the vanilla cake batter for a true zebra pattern! If you add a few drops of black food coloring to the chocolate batter you’ll end up with black stripes and white stripes. You can even add some chocolate chips as a filler between the cake layers!

• If you really like a chocolate flavor, layer in three different chocolate batters: white chocolate, milk chocolate, and dark chocolate. (Yum!) Talk about some lovely chocolate stripes!
• Another dual-toned zebra effects is the strawberry-lemonade cake. Talk about a popular combination! Merge strawberry cake mix and lemon cake mix for a variation in both color and flavor.
• One of my favorite zebra-striped cakes was this rainbow zebra cake I did for my granddaughter’s birthday a couple of years back. I used a multiplicity of colors! (Ignore the support straw in the middle, please!)

Other Sweet Treats You Can Zebra Stripe:

• You can stripe your cupcakes, dropping different colors of batter in by the tablespoon.
• A bundt cake can be zebra striped, too!
• You can zebra stripe your chocolate covered Oreos.
• Guess what? You can even zebra stripe cake pops!

You can have a lot of fun zebra-striping your cakes and other sweet treats. Leave a comment with your favorite flavor or color combinations below!

While you’re perusing the web, check on Full Plate Thursday on Miz Helen’s Country Cottage for more great baking ideas!

Also, check out Weekend Potluck over at South Your Mouth. They’ve got some yummy offerings!

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About the Author

Janice Thompson is an author, baker, and all-around mischief maker! She has overcome a host of baking catastrophes, including a toppled wedding cake, to learn more about the baking process. Janice has published over 150 books for the Christian market but particularly enjoys writing recipes and baking devotions. To learn more about Janice or to drop her a note, visit her About the Author page.