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Ever wished for a keto cake that tastes as fabulous as it looks, without all the carbs? With my vanilla low carb cake recipe, you absolutely can! It’s got three moist layers, that classic yellow cake flavor, and creamy cream cheese frosting. Plus, I love that I can make the batter all in one bowl. I think this is the perfect keto birthday cake. Make it with me for your next special occasion!
Why You Need My Keto Cake Recipe
- Moist, fluffy, and sweet – To me, the best keto cake is about the texture, as well as sweetness without any weird aftertaste. So many of them are dry! This one is extremely moist and fluffy, with a light, tender crumb, and a sweet vanilla flavor. What you won’t taste is any bitterness or cooling effect — I can’t stand those!
- Keto friendly and gluten-free, but also family friendly – With only 2 grams of net carbs per slice, this cake fits perfectly into your keto lifestyle without feeling like you’re missing out. But with a large cake like this, I think it’s just as important that you won’t be the only one wanting to eat it. My family and friends happily do!
- Great for any occasion – I first made this recipe as a keto birthday cake, but have since served it for other holidays as well. It’s a great keto dessert for any celebration you have coming up.
Ingredients & Substitutions
Here I explain the best ingredients for my low carb birthday cake recipe recipe, what each one does, and substitution options. For measurements, see the recipe card.
Keto Cake:
- Low Carb Flours – I use both my Wholesome Yum Blanched Almond Flour and Wholesome Yum Coconut Flour for this recipe, because the texture turns out so much better than using one of them alone. The almond flour is particularly important because many brands are too coarse and will leave your cake grainy, and in fact this is why I created the Wholesome Yum version. YMMV with other brands! Steer clear of almond meal as well, which is the worst for texture. If you want a cake that uses just one of these flours, browse my other almond flour recipes or coconut flour recipes for other options.
- Besti Monk Fruit Allulose Blend – My go-to sweetener for every low carb cake I make, and there’s a reason. Not only does it taste and bake like sugar, it keeps your cake super moist. I’ve tried so many other sugar substitutes, and the result is much more dry (sometimes even gritty) with most brands. If you still want to use something else, check my sweetener conversion chart to get the right amount.
- Unsalted Butter & Salt – I add salt separately to control the flavor, but feel free to just use salted butter. If you’re dairy-free, coconut oil is a decent stand-in, but keep in mind, it’ll change the flavor and texture a bit. Oh, and you’ll need to find a dairy-free option for the frosting, too!
- Eggs – You need a lot because of the coconut flour. I have a list of egg substitutes here, but with the number of eggs in this keto cake recipe, I don’t think they would would work here.
- Almond Milk – You can use store bought or my homemade almond milk, just make sure it’s unsweetened. You can also swap in other keto-friendly milks, like coconut milk beverage (the liquid kind from a carton, not the thick kind from a can) or watered down heavy cream.
- Vanilla Extract & Baking Powder – I like this brand of vanilla and this non-GMO baking powder.
Cream Cheese Frosting:
- Cream Cheese – Go for the full-fat stuff if you can; it’s richer and just works better with the keto cake.
- Besti Powdered Monk Fruit Allulose Blend – Unlike other powdered sugar alternatives, this one dissolves completely (read: no gritty texture!) and is truly as fine as powdered sugar. Others can crystallize, too, so I highly recommend using this one.
- Butter & Vanilla Extract
Free Printable: Low Carb & Keto Food List
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Frosting Variations:
Not a fan of cream cheese frosting? You can make my keto buttercream frosting for something more classic, or keto chocolate frosting if you want a contrast to the vanilla. Throw on some sugar free sprinkles for a little extra fun!
How To Make Keto Cake
I have step-by-step photos here to help you visualize the recipe. For full instructions with amounts and temperatures, see the recipe card.
- Cream the butter and Besti. Use a hand mixer to beat them in a large mixing bowl, until fluffy.
- Add the wet ingredients. Beat in the eggs, almond milk, and vanilla extract.
- Add the dry ingredients. Beat in the almond flour, coconut flour, and baking powder. The batter will be pretty thick — this is normal!
- Bake until golden. Divide the batter among 3 lined cake pans (I prefer springform pans for easy release). You won’t be able to pour it, so just spoon it in and smooth the top. After baking, let your cake layers cool completely.
- Make the frosting. While you wait for the cakes to cool, beat together the cream cheese, butter, powdered Besti, and vanilla extract in a large bowl, until smooth.
- Layer, layer, layer. Place one layer on a cake stand or platter and spread frosting on top. Repeat with the other two layers. Finally, frost the top and sides of your keto cake.
- Top with chopped pecans. My cake looked prettier with the nuts on top, and I didn’t have to obsess about making the frosting perfectly smooth. But, if your frosting skills are better than mine, feel free to skip the nuts and decorate the top however you like!
This low carb cake is tall, very rich, and filling, so I usually slice it into very thin slices for serving, but did slightly larger ones for these pictures. Here you can see the texture once you slice into it:
My Recipe Tips
- Use room temperature ingredients. Especially the butter, eggs, and almond milk. Your butter won’t cream properly if it’s cold. And if your eggs or milk are cold, they’ll solidify the butter as soon as you add them.
- Be careful not to overmix the batter. Overmixing can make the cake dense instead of light and fluffy, which is definitely not what we’re going for.
- Don’t forget to scrape down the sides of the bowl. I always recommend this, but especially here since we’re making this batter all in one bowl. If you don’t mind extra dishes, you could mix the dry ingredients separately first to reduce the amount of scraping you have to do.
- This keto cake is fragile, so I recommend springform pans. They make getting the layers out so much easier! You can use regular cake pans if that’s what you’ve got, though.
- Don’t have 3 pans? You can definitely make this keto cake recipe in 2 pans instead, or even a larger 9×13 pan for a sheet cake, like a reader asked me recently. (The baking time will vary, so you’ll need to check on it.) I don’t recommend waiting for layers to bake one at a time, though. I used to do this, but the baking powder isn’t effective in the batter sitting that long, so no longer do it.
- Rotate and swap the positions of the pans halfway through baking. Since you’ll have 3 pans in the oven at once, they’ll bake more evenly if you do this. Be quick, so you don’t let too much heat out!
Keto Cake (Very Moist, Easy Recipe)
By
This easy keto cake recipe is so rich, sweet and moist, that no one will guess it's low carb (2g net carbs per slice). Perfect for birthdays!
Ingredients
[ See substitutions ]Tap underlined ingredients to see the ones I use.
Keto Cake:
Cream Cheese Frosting:
Instructions
[ See step photos See my tips ]Tap on the times in the instructions to start a kitchen timer.
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Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C). Line the bottoms of 3 9-inch (23-cm) round springform pans with parchment paper.
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In a large bowl, use a hand mixer to beat together the butter and Besti, until fluffy.
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Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then the almond milk and vanilla extract.
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Beat in the almond flour, coconut flour, baking powder, and salt.
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Divide the batter among the 3 prepared pans and smooth the tops with a spatula. Bake for 18-22 minutes, until the top is lightly golden and springs back.
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Meanwhile, make the frosting. In a large bowl, beat together the cream cheese, butter, powdered Besti, and vanilla extract, until smooth.
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Let the keto cake layers cool separately to room temperature before stacking. Frost between the layers, and all over the top and sides at the end. Top with chopped pecans (optional) if you like.
Did you make it? Leave a review or tag me @wholesomeyum on Instagram!
Maya’s Recipe Notes
Serving size: 1 slice, or 1/24 of entire recipe
- Tips: Check out my recipe tips above to help you avoid dense cake, keep your batter smooth, and options for different types of pans.
- Store or make ahead: You can make the whole keto cake birthday cake in advance and refrigerate until the day-of, or just store any leftovers. Either way, your cake will last up to 3 days in the fridge.
- Freeze: You can freeze this cake for up to 3 months. Place freeze it uncovered on a sheet pan first, uncovered to protect the frosting. Once solid, wrap in several layers of plastic wrap and foil to freeze long-term. Before serving, unwrap the layers and thaw in the fridge overnight.
- Note on nutrition info: The optional pecans are not included in the numbers below.
I provide nutrition facts as a courtesy. Have questions about calculations or why you got a different result? Please see my nutrition policy.
Add Your Notes Your Notes
Try More Of My Recipes
© Copyright Maya Krampf for Wholesome Yum. Please DO NOT SCREENSHOT OR COPY/PASTE recipes to social media or websites. We’d LOVE for you to share a link with photo instead.
Keto Cake
More Keto Cake Recipes
If you like this keto birthday cake, you might also like some of my other low carb cake recipes:
678 Comments
Ana
0This cake has been an absolute success amongst all my friends – low carb followers or not.
I divide the batter in 2 only and bake for about 28 min. It’s a nice height, I believe divided in 3 will be too shallow. Also I use whipping cream instead of almond milk.
Just finished baking once again – this time for the birthday of a non-low carb friend (his request!).
Dee
0To be dairy free, can I eliminate the cream cheese for the frosting, but keep the rest of the ingredients? We are allergic.
Wholesome Yum M
0Hi Dee, You can sub coconut oil for the butter listed in the recipe to make it dairy-free, that would work fine. The frosting would need to be changed a bit in order for it work without the cream cheese. I suggest substituting with dairy-free cream cheese to save on the amount of powdered sweetener you would need to use.
Ana
0Delicious! I divided the recipe by 4 and baked on a 7in pan for 21 min (18 was not enough). It came out perfect, tasty and moist. It was devoured at once by 2 adults and 2 children!
Thanks for another great the recipe!
N. Insley
0Can this recipe be baked in a 9×11 baking pan instead of a springform pan?
Maya | Wholesome Yum
0Yes, you can do that but the baking time might be different.
Terry
0I am always wary of trying Keto/GF dessert recipes because, sadly, there are usually awful! Even when there are a lot of comments, many people rate before they even trying the recipe. I tried this recipe today. It was easy and it came out great! I cut it in half, baked it at once (One tier) ,and added five minutes to the baking time. I will be keeping this recipe! Thank you so much!
Veronica
0Great recipe! The only issue I had (and it’s not your issue but mine), is that I have a strong dislike for coconut and the coconut flour overwhelmed the flavor of the cake. Second time around I substituted lupin flour and it still came out perfectly, with full vanilla flavor.
Tammy Badeaux
0Our entire office is now Keto – Made this for a group of gentlemen, it was devoured in minutes!
Loved how easy it was. And not a huge amount of ingredients. I used two 9″ round pounds and it worked perfectly.
AGV
0I loved this recipe, any way you could help out in making it a bit more moist mine came out a bit on the dry side. Other than that tastes great.
Jennifer Oldfield
0Do you HAVE TO use coconut flour or can you use all almond flour?
Wholesome Yum M
0Hi Jennifer, Yes, you can use almond flour. Increase the amount of almond flour to 4 cups and omit the coconut flour. Enjoy!
Zaida Jimenez
0I’m planning on halving batter for two 6 inch pans. Would 27 minutes at 350 be a good bake time, or longer/shorter?
Wholesome Yum M
0Hi Zaida, Your cake rounds will take less time to bake. I would start checking for doneness around the 18-minute mark.
Eva
0Love it.
Will make it again for 100%. Did with few changes, but the most of it is from your recipe. Didn’t have just Erythritol- so, used xylitol and Monk fruit. I added choco in 2/3. So it’s layered choco- vanila- choco.. and Instead of crerm cheese i used ricotta cheese. ( Don’t like salt and sourness of cream cheese).
Covered with chocolate
Thank you
Linda Wootton
0I was teaching my granddaughter how to bake a cake without using sugar. It was my trial run in order to make the cake for my girlfriend on her birthday. Everything went so good and then it didn’t rise so I started looking at the recipe and realized I didn’t add baking powder. We went ahead and frosted think it would be like a cookie however I was moist and really good!!! Great recipe next time I’ll use the baking powder. 🙂
Jackie
0I only bought powdered erythritol – can I use it in the cake recipe?
Wholesome Yum M
0Hi Jackie, Yes that will work just fine!
Jodi Grow
0Thank you for this wonderful recipe! It was delicious and guilt free. My entire family loved it.
Valerie Rankin
0I am one of those ‘very special people’ that cannot tolerate erythritol (Or isomalt, malitol, mannitol, sorbitol, and especially xylitol). Do you think xantham gum + a little monk fruit would give me lift I need? All I want is a birthday cake 🙂 ..As a diabetic I’m glad I found your page. tks
Wholesome Yum A
0Hi Valerie, have you tried allulose? It might work better for you. You’ll need a lot less, so xanthan gum and monk fruit might be useful to add too. Check my sweetener conversion calculator to get an exact measurement.
Claire
0If I substitute Truvia for erythritol, how much more of each flour should I add?
Thank you!
Wholesome Yum M
0Hi Clarie, If using the granular form of Truvia there should be no additional modifications needed.
Patty Bernateau
0My mom is an insulin dependent diabetic and a cancer patient. We are so glad to have her another year and I was so happy to make this as her birthday cake. We loved it, used swerve granulated for the cake and swerve confectioners for the frosting and it came out delicious and moist. I’d love to share pics if I can!
Talia
0Do you cover the decorated cake and store in the fridge or can you leave it uncovered? Thanks!
Wholesome Yum
0Hi Talia, I would store it covered in the fridge if possible.
Lisa Marie
0I just made this and put it in a 9 x 13 pan. Modifications: added a bit of salt, about 10 drops of French Vanilla stevia, and half a bag of Lily’s chocolate chips. (Didn’t use the frosting. Didn’t need it!) Cooking time increased to about 30-35 minutes. PERFECT cake! Very moist and makes a ton! I ended up with 16 good-sized pieces. : )
Thanks for this recipe base!
Rosanna Kobayashi
0Just wondering would it be alright to use all almond flour or is the coconut flour needed?
If I use all almond then do I not need as many eggs?
Wholesome Yum A
0Hi Rosanna, I don’t recommend exchanging almond and coconut flours — you’ll need the combination of both to get a cake-like consistency.