Marbled Red Velvet Bundt

Yield: 1 bundt cake // Total Time: 1 hr. // Disclaimer: This post includes affiliate links. //

Light and fluffy vanilla cake swirled with a generous amount of chocolate-y red velvet cake, topped with a cream cheese frosting.

Marbled Red Velvet Bundt

Is there any cake more fit for the holidays (& valentine’s day!) than a red velvet one? Of course I love marbling my cakes so today I have for you this delicious and fun-to-look-at marbled red velvet bundt cake! Below you’ll find all the tips and tricks you’ll need to make this delicious and festive cake.

Recipe tips

Weigh your ingredients

• Weighing your ingredients is important for getting the recipe perfect and getting consistent results. Not weighing your ingredients can lead to adding too much or too little of an ingredient and can easily throw off a recipe. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend purchasing a kitchen scale. This one is super cheap and worked well for me when I was starting out!

Mix the batter carefully

• It is super important to not overmix the cake batter or you end up with a tough and chewy cake rather than a light and moist cake. When alternating between adding the wet and dry ingredients, be sure to only mix just until the ingredient is fully combined and no more. You’ll also want to be extra careful when mixing in the cocoa and red food dye at the end!

Room temperature ingredients

• It is important for the ingredients to be at room temperature so that they properly incorporate with each other. Take out the egg, butter, and buttermilk at least 30 minutes and up to 1 hr 30 min. before starting the recipe. To bring an egg to room temperature quickly, you can place it under hot water for 1 minute. To bring butter to room temperature quickly, slice it, place it on a plate, and microwave it in 5-second intervals. For buttermilk, you can also microwave it in 5-second intervals until it’s no longer cold (but not hot!)

Keep an eye on that cake!

• Baked goods like to go from under-baked to over-baked super quickly so it is important to keep a close eye on them. Start checking at 25 minutes with a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out wet, check again after 5 minutes, then every 2-3 minutes until the toothpick comes out with just a few moist crumbs on it.

Ingredients and substitutions

For the marbled cake:

All purpose flour: the structure of the cake.

Baking powder: for helping the cake rise.

Salt: for balancing and bringing out the sweetness of the cake.

Unsalted butter: for tenderizing the cake and giving it that classic buttery taste. You can substitute in salted butter, just be sure to reduce the added salt from 3/4 tsp. to 1/4 tsp.

Vegetable oil: for tenderizing the cake. You can substitute any neutral oil, such as canola, in place of vegetable oil.

Granulated sugar: for sweetening the cake and keeping it moist. The sugar also helps aerate the butter to give this cake its rise.

Eggs: for moisture, structure, and binding the batter together.

Vanilla: I use and love this vanilla extract.

Buttermilk: for tenderizing the cake and adding moisture. I highly recommend using buttermilk but I know it can be hard or annoying to purchase, especially if you don’t plan on using it for anything else. It won’t be completely the same, but you can make a homemade buttermilk substitute. For this recipe, simply combine 10g of lemon juice or vinegar with 160g of whole milk and use it as normal. You can also mix together 65g sour cream and 105g milk for a similar result.

Cocoa powder: Use natural unsweetened cocoa powder here for the best color results.

Red food coloring: I recommend using gel-based food coloring because the pigment is much more vibrant.

For the cream cheese frosting:

Cream cheese: the base of the frosting, has a slight tanginess that compliments the sweet cake. I recommend using full-fat, but neufchatel will work as well!

Powdered sugar: for sweetening and thickening up the frosting.

Vanilla: for flavor.

Heavy cream: for thinning out the frosting. Milk will also work well here.

How to: marbled red velvet bundt cake

Here are the steps to follow to make this cake. You can find the complete recipe (which is printable!) at the end of this blog post.

1. Prep ingredients. In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt and set aside.

2. Cream together the fat and sugar. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or in a large bowl and with a hand mixer) cream together the butter, oil and granulated sugar for 3 minutes. The mixture should get super light and fluffy and be white in color.

3. Add in the eggs and vanilla. Beat for an additional minute, until well combined.

4. Alternate the wet and dry ingredients. Alternate between adding the flour mixture and the buttermilk. Gently mix in 1/2 of the flour mixture just until no flour streaks remain, then mix in all of the buttermilk, followed by the remaining half of the flour mixture.

5. Make the red velvet cake. Transfer 2 cups of the batter to a small bowl. Add the cocoa and red food coloring to the small bowl, and gently mix the ingredients together until the mixture is cohesive.

6. Layer the batter. Spread ⅓ of the vanilla batter into the bottom of the bundt pan, and top with ⅓ of the red velvet batter. Repeat until all of the batter has been used, then use a knife to swirl the batter around in the pan.

7. Bake. Bake the bundt for 30-35 minutes, until a knife inserted in the center of the cake comes out with only a few moist crumbs on it. Bundt cakes have a tendency to dry out easily, so be sure to keep a close eye on it!

8. Invert the cake. Let the cake cool in the pan for 10-15 minutes, then invert the cake out on to a cooling rack. Cool completely before frosting.

9. Make the frosting. In a small bowl, beat together the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, and heavy cream. Once the cake has completely cooled to room temperature, generously frost it with the cream cheese frosting.

10. Slice, serve, and enjoy!

Marbled Red Velvet Bundt Q & A

Can I make this in a different-sized bundt pan?

• Definitely! I used a smaller bundt pan than some of my other bundt cake’s here (7 cup capacity compared to a 12 cup capacity) If you’re making it in a standard large bundt pan (12 cups), just double all of the ingredients and you’re good to go. If you have a 10-cup bundt pan you can multiply the ingredients by 1.5 and turn some of the batter into cupcakes. Please use grams if possible for the best results!

How do I prevent the cake from sticking to the bundt?

• To make sure your cake doesn’t stick, generously butter it, making sure to get all of the crevices. An easy way to do this is to melt 1-2 tbsp. of butter and use a pastry brush to brush the inside of the bundt. Then, generously pour some sugar or flour into the pan and shake it around so that it completely coats the inside. Tap out any excess and then you’re good to go! If you’re ever making a chocolate cake, you can coat the inside with cocoa powder.

How should I store this cake?

• Because the frosting has cream cheese in it, it does need to be refrigerated. I’d recommend waiting to frost the cake until up to 2 hours before serving for the best food safety practices. Otherwise, you can either store the unfrosted cake at room temperature and the frosting in the fridge, or the whole frosted cake in the fridge.

Why do you measure in grams?

My recipes are all written in grams because it is the most accurate way to bake. When you use a kitchen scale, you ensure that your baked goods turn out as close to the written recipe as possible. Plus, the cleanup is way easier when using a scale! I will provide standard cup measurements but please note that I have not tested the recipe using cup measurements and therefore can not guarantee your recipe will come out how mine did. Here is my favorite kitchen scale, and here’s an article about why I use a kitchen scale, and why you should too!

A note on oven temperature

Ovens vary and fluctuate in temperature. For example, I always have to set my oven to 330°F if I want it to bake at 350°F. If you love to bake like I do, I highly recommend getting an oven thermometer. They are super helpful for letting you know when your oven might be lying to you! I use this one.

Tools and ingredients

You can find all my favorite tools and ingredients that I use on my Amazon Storefront page, here!