This strawberry sheet cake with lemon cream cheese frosting recipe is so simple but delivers phenomenal results! I love cake recipes that use standard pantry ingredients as this sheet cake recipe does. There’s nothing fancy except the results!
Like all good strawberry cake recipes, it uses tons of fresh strawberries. I think fresh is best in fruit cake recipes!
After tasting this fantastic sheet cake, I’m sure you’re gonna want more of the same. Strawberry poke cake, strawberry pound cake strawberry shortcake cake, and strawberry layer cake feed a crowd and knock their socks off delicious!
Let’s head to the kitchen and start baking!
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What I Love About This Recipe
- The fluffy lemony cream cheese frosting
- The fresh strawberries in the cake and frosting
- Makes plenty to go around
- Looks as good as it tastes
How To Make Strawberry Sheet Cake Recipe
Prep your baking dish with nonstick spray and parchment paper. Combine the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla and lemon juice. Combine the dry ingredients. Add the dry ingredients alternating with the buttermilk. Mix until just combined. Fold in the strawberries, spread the batter in the pan, and bake.
To prepare the frosting, cream together 1/2 the sugar and the cream cheese. Fold in the strawberries. In a separate bowl, mix the heavy cream and lemon juice until frothy. Mix on medium-high speed, adding in the remaining sugar until stiff peaks form. Fold the cream into the cream cheese mixture. Spread over the cake.
Strawberry Cake Recipe Notes
Here are few tips on how to make this strawberry cake the best it can be!
Chopping the strawberries – The berries should be chopped or diced into small pieces. Big chunks will create soggy pockets in the cake.
Tips For Making The Perfect Strawberry Sheet Cake
Folding – The key to fluffy frosting and a light, airy cake is to fold in the strawberries by hand. To fold, pull your spatula through the middle of the batter and fold one side. Continue that until everything is well mixed.
Stirring will knock the air out of the whipped cream and cake batter, and it also breakdown the berries.
Ingredient Notes
Lemon – I suggest using a fresh lemon. 1 lemon should be plenty for both the cake and frosting. There are lots of different ways to juice a lemon, but I like to roll it on the counter with firm pressure to get the juices flowing before I cut it.
Cake Flour – Cake flour has lower gluten and makes the cake more tender. I highly suggest it, but in a pinch, you can use all-purpose flour with a bit of corn starch mixed in. Put 2 tablespoons of corn starch at the bottom of the 1 cup measuring cup and add all-purpose flour on top of it. Put 1 tablespoon in the 1/2 cup.
Storing Tips
Store this cake in a well-sealed container in the fridge. If you don’t have a top for your cake pan, you can use toothpicks to keep the clingwrap from sticking to the frosting.
Can You Freeze This?
I don’t recommend freezing the frosted cake. However, the cake itself will freeze just fine using proper freezing techniques. Allow it to thaw in the fridge overnight and frost it just before serving.
Cake Make Ahead Tips
You can make the cake a day or two ahead of time, but hold off on the frosting until you’re ready to serve. You can also freeze your cake as a make-ahead step.
How Long Can You Keep This In The Fridge?
According to food handling suggestions, this cake will last up to 7 days in the fridge, but the frosting starts to lose its texture after a couple of days.
Strawberry Sheet Cake with Lemon Frosting
Ingredients
Cake:
- 1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
- 2 cups sugar
- 2 eggs large
- 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 1/2 cups cake flour
- 2 tablespoons strawberry flavored jello gelatin powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup buttermilk well shaken
- 2/3 cups fresh strawberries chopped
Frosting:
- 8 ounces cream cheese at room temperature
- 2/3 cups sugar divided
- 2/3 cups fresh strawberries chopped
- 1 1/2 cups heavy cream
- 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 9 X 13-inch baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. Line baking dish with parchment paper with the long sides extending 2-3 inches. Spray parchment with nonstick cooking spray.
- Using a stand up electric mixer, beat butter until creamy. Slowly add sugar then continue to beat 4-5 minutes until it's fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, and beat after each addition until they're incorporated. Add lemon juice and vanilla and mix in.
- In a small bowl combine flour, strawberry jello, baking soda, and salt. Add the flour mixture to butter mixture alternating with the buttermilk, beginning and ending with the flour mixture, mixing until just combined. Gently stir in strawberries. Pour batter into prepared baking pan and bake in preheated oven for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool cake completely. Lift the cake out of the pan, using the parchment paper extensions.
- Make the frosting: In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese with 1/3 cup of sugar until mixture is smooth. Fold in strawberries.
- In a large bowl, beat the cream and lemon juice until mixture is frothy. Continue beating on medium-high speed and gradually add the remaining 1/3 cup sugar. Beat until mixture forms stiff peaks. Fold half of the whipped cream mixture into the cream cheese mixture until just incorporated. Fold in the rest of the whipped cream mixture.
- Immediately spread the top and sides of the cake with frosting. Serve 🙂
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More Sheet Cake Recipes
Sheet cake is the way to go to feed a crowd! Be sure to try these!
Conclusion
I can’t decide what I love more about this strawberry sheet cake recipe- the cake or the frosting! It’s such a simple cake that always delivers big results! I can’t wait to hear how it works for you!
Be sure to leave a comment below!
Source: Southern Living
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This looks so good and makes me wish we were heading back into summer! Lovely cake!
Me too, Kristen!
Please ignore first email, didn’t hit bake on the oven. Ugh. Been a long day! Ha
Oh Wendy! That happens to all of us some days!! Hoped the cake baked up nicely for you <3
My cake is taking longer than 40 min, is that normal?
Would this cake be dense enough to stack in layers?
Hi Jess. I haven’t done that yet, but I believe the cake would be firm enough for stacking. The frosting, I’m not so sure about in a layer cake situation. You might need to tweek it to make it frimer so it doesn’t oooze out between the layers. Please stop back by and let us know how it goes <3
I made this cake for Easter and it was amazing! It was so delicious and beautiful too! Thank you 🙂
So happy you liked the cake!
I’m a fan of all cakes but most of all strawberry cake. I also love to ccok, however when it comes to baking I leave it to the experts. Nonetheless, when I stumbled upon this recipe, I had to try it. So far I’ve made it 3 times and the last attemp was a layered cake for my best friends baby shower so you can imagine the pressure was on and it was devoured with request for the recipe.. I did not make any adjustments. Firmness and density was perfect. Tomorrow I’ll make it for the 4th time as a request from a birthday girl who lives on a diet of sushi and sake and this cake is her only wish. Also, I forgot to mention this is the BEST and Easy Strawberry cake ever. Thank you so much for the recipe
Thank you so much for sharing all your experiences, Natasha! You absolutely made my day. It makes me so happy that you’ve made this cake so many times <3 You're a baking Rock Star!!
My daughter requested a strawberry lemonade cake for her 13th birthday. I stumbled across this recipe and thought I would give it a whirl. Delicious! My husband has even requested that I make this for his birthday 9 months from now! This night be a new birthday go to.
Hello Lisa. Wow! I’m so happy your family liked the cake so much!
OK, you convinced me, I’m baking this cake on Wednesday for a large ladies’ get-together! I can’t wait! Love that it is so from scratch and not just a bunch of boxed items all combined. Yay!! I’ll let you know how it goes.
I hope you enjoy1 I think this is a really, really amazing recipe 🙂
I look forward to hearing from you 🙂
Sorry, I didn’t care for it that much. I was expecting more of a real cake but this seemed more like a cobbler without the fruit part. It was quite dense and just not soft and fluffy like cakes normally are. Not your fault, it just wasn’t for me. The frosting was good, although I think I would prefer it with the lemon flavor of lemon zest rather than the tartness of the actual juice. But still good, especially in the combination of the cake since it gave the cake itself more flavor.
Hi sorry to ask but can i substitute lemon for lime or that gives a different taste
Hi Claudia. I haven’t tried using lime, but I think it should work out really well.
I’m going to make this to take to a party this Saturday!
Must I limit the chopped strawberries to 2/3 cup each section (cake and icing) when I have so many?
Hi Salsa Dancer. I’ve only made the recipe as I wrote it in the post. Sometimes extra strawberries can change the ratio of liquid ingredients to dry ingredients. Honestly, not sure how it would work in this recipe. I’d love to hear back from you if you try adding more 🙂
Hi Kathleen! I read through all of the comments to find a substitute for the Strawberry jello, as I haven’t found it here in Italy. I am hoping it is used just to intensify the flavor of strawberries. I will try using homemade strawberry jam to see if that works.. Also, I am making cupcakes!
Hi Valerie. I can’t wait to hear how your cake comes out 🙂