Vanilla Crazy Cake You Can Make With No Eggs, Milk, Or Butter
I’ve got the craziest recipe for you guys today! But I suppose you already knew that from the title, didn’t you?
Vanilla Crazy Cake – also known as Wacky Cake or Depression Cake, doesn’t need dairy or eggs to make them.
Want more cake recipes? Check out:
- Bailey’s Mousse Cake
- Almond Bundt Cake
- The Best Icebox Cakes
- Rainbow Unicorn Cake
- Chocolate Crazy Cake
- Victoria Sponge Cake
In fact, you don’t even need to get a separate bowl dirty – you can make it right in the pan!
These cakes became popular during the Great Depression when eggs and dairy products were expensive and hard to come by. Nowadays, they’re great for people with food allergies, and everyone will love them!
All things aside, sometimes we just need a quick and delicious way to satisfy our sweet tooth and this is it!
The beauty is, you can change out ingredients or add to it as needed. Take the basis of this recipe and add sprinkles or a different flavored extract. Maybe you want to make it a fun color, you can add some food dye and truly make it fun and colorful.
Have fun making this cake and we cannot wait to see the look on your face when it’s made without those eggs and and dairy products!
What You’ll Need To Make Vanilla Crazy Cake:
- All-purpose flour
- Sugar
- Baking soda
- Salt
- White vinegar
- Vegetable oil
- Water
- Pure vanilla extract
How To Make Vanilla Crazy Cake:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix the flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a greased 8″ square (or round…I prefer the round, but I’ve made this in both) baking pan.
Make 3 depressions in the dry ingredients – two small and one large. Pour the vinegar and vanilla in each of the two smaller depressions, and the vegetable oil in the large one.
Pour water over the entire thing and mix until smooth.
Bake on the middle rack of the oven at 350 degrees for 35 minutes. Let it cool, then top with your favorite frosting and enjoy!
If you’re more of a chocolate fan, check out our Chocolate Crazy Cake recipe!
Ingredients
- 1 ½ Cups All-purpose flour
- 1 Cup Sugar
- 1 tsp Baking soda
- ½ tsp Salt
- 1 tsp White vinegar
- 5 tbsp Vegetable oil
- 1 Cup Water
- 1 ½ tsp Pure vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix the flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a greased 8″ square (or round…I prefer the round, but I’ve made this in both) baking pan.
- Make 3 depressions in the dry ingredients – two small and one large. Pour the vinegar and vanilla in each of the two smaller depressions, and the vegetable oil in the large one.
- Pour water over the entire thing and mix until smooth.
- Bake on the middle rack of the oven at 350 degrees for 35 minutes. Let it cool, then top with your favorite frosting and enjoy!
What about frosting?
You can use pretty much any frosting you want to!
I made it with cream soda in place of the water it was good
oh, I bet that WAS good!
This is missing how much of each ingredient needed; this would be helpful in the future. Thanks!
When it got updated, it pulled out the amounts for some reason. My apologies! I’ve added them back in!
Okay I know this sounds crazy, but we refreshed the recipe and when we updated it, it actually pulled out the amounts. I just added them back in. My apologies!
What amounts do you use of each ingredient?
Okay I know this sounds crazy, but we refreshed the recipe and when we updated it, it actually pulled out the amounts. I just added them back in. My apologies!
So, I made this with pure whole wheat flour and added Almond essence instead of Vanilla.
It was brilliant! For the top, I crushed some almonds and roasted them. Them I got some date palm sugar, water, a pinch of salt and a few drops of the Almond essence and cooked it until it became sticky and topped the cake with that.
YUM. Super soft, moist and super YUMMY.
Oops, sorry. I also added the Almonds to the sticky topping as I cooked it. In case anyone wanted to know.
That sounds AMAZiNG!
My family LOVES this cake, but not with the above instructions. I basically make it the same way I make my chocolate wacky cake, minus the cocoa powder. That means, for a full cake, I use 1 Tablespoon of vinegar, and 6 Tablespoons of oil. I also up the vanilla a bit to 2 teaspoons and added in 1/4 cup of rainbow sprinkles. I aways mix the dry separate and then add the wet, gently, just until mixed. Do NOT overmix!! I love to make it in the microwave. It takes about 3-3:15 min. in mine. I just do a half batch and bake it up in my microwave brownie maker that I got at the Dollar Store, but I also have a small Pyrex dish I use sometimes, too. I’d definitely recommend trying it again if you’ve had trouble. It REALLY is good!!
My daughter made this cake last night.
It was a huge hit. She is super proud of her, she did a great job. I’m really glad I came across this recipe, this was her very first cake she’s made without a boxed mix.
Next time I’ll have her use a bit less sugar, with the icing being so sweet, the mixed cake and icing was super sweet, but still delicious.
Why use vinegar?
Vinegar and baking soda is the egg replacement
hot water or cold water . . .?
cold
I just wanted to say the only good thing abt this cake is that I died it blue other then that I do not recommend this shit they call cake I don’t know where u got this recipe cause I think it’s from the playdo factory
Maybe you just can’t bake.
Hahahaha
This cake turned out great! I made cupcakes (as a tester) and then used the recipe for a large cake at work (retirement cake) and both times it turned out delicious. I didn’t separate the liquids into wells but just mixed it all into the dry ingredients. Still turned out. Thanks for the recipe!
Can I use baking powder instead of baking soda ?
I’ll let you know. I accidentally used baking powder instead of soda.
Made cupcakes tonight. They smell amazing. Can’t wait to frost them!
This recipe is now my go to for birthday treats. I made 12 beautiful cupcakes and my family loved them! I will be making more for sure.
I just made this cake and it’s delicious!!So easy to make.Im having some with tea.
I used 1tsp of lime juice and 4tbsp of baking powder to replace the vinegar and baking soda because I was out
Can you use canola oil instead of vegetable oil don’t have vegetable oil in and want to try this tonight thanks as my daughter has a high intolerance to eggs
A great recipe. Always turns out. I mix it in a bowl first and then put in a pan. I like to use coconut and/or almond milk in place of the water to make it more moist. Easily adaptable. Add flaked coconut and coconut extract, coconut oil and milk for coconut cake. Add tablespoon pumpkin pie spice for spice cake. My son, who has dairy and egg allergies, loves this cake!
I’m testing cupcakes for my daughter’s bday party and saw comments about texture. I made vanilla and chocolate and noticed the difference is chocolate has 3Tbl of cocoa powder and the batter is thicker. So a little extra flour in the vanilla I recipe makes them more similar. Overall yummy and easy.
This vanilla crazy cake is much much better on day 2. I almost threw it out after having a slice the day it was baked. Glad I tried it again the next day. The chocolate cake is great on day 1.
Will this be a good base for a white forest cake
Is there a reason why this is mixed in the pan, or can I mix it in a bowl and pour it in. Thanks!
this is a horrible recipe it made me sick.
I made it for a friend, and she loved it!!
Love this ‘GoTo’ cake as my Grandma used to call it. I love adding a can of Mandarin oranges.musing the juice mostly instead of water.. Mmm with a nice buttercream icing it was an all time fave at our place when kids were growing up. Oh, as well I use only half cup raw cane sugar or fresh honey when available too.