How to make Dot Cakes at home

We don’t get behind every baking trend (just listen to me talk on a recent episode of our podcast about how much I dislike chocolate chip cookie croissants), but as a devoted cake lover I’ve been paying attention to the latest viral baked good, the Dot Cake. 

What’s a Dot Cake?

A Dot Cake, for the uninitiated, is a ramekin-sized cake topped with a layer of frosting and then paved edge to edge with rainbow nonpareils. It was invented by a Long Island bakery called Dotcakes, but Butterfield Market, a grocery store on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, has done for the Dot Cake what Magnolia Bakery did for the cupcake in the early 2000s, and is credited with fueling the latest Dot Cake craze. Propelled by social media users who fell hard for these nostalgia treats, there are now lines, a limit to how many you can purchase, and, of course, imitators.

Happily, there’s another way to get a taste of a Dot Cake: Make your own at home. Not only can you customize your cake and frosting flavors, given that the going rate for a single storebought Dot Cake is $11, you’ll also be saving money.

What You’ll Need to Make Dot Cakes

• Cake: You can make Dot Cakes with a scratch-baked cake, like our Original Cake Pan Cake or our Quick and Easy Vanilla Cake. But this is a great time to use a cake mix. Our favorite is our vanilla-forward Confetti Cake and Cupcake Mix, but you can make a Dot Cake with whatever type of cake you like, from our Golden Yellow Cake to our Deliciously Simple Chocolate Cake Mix to one of our Gluten-Free mixes. One 8” single-layer cake yields 4 Dot Cakes (save the scraps in the freezer for a batch of our Birthday Cake Ice Cream).

Photography by Patrick Marinello; food styling by Lydia Fournier

• Frosting: Our Chocolate Buttercream or Easy Vanilla Buttercream are both great choices; we also have Buttercream and Chocolate Buttercream frosting mixes, too. For 4 dot cakes you’ll need about 1 to 1 1/2 cups frosting.
• Sprinkles! The original Dot Cakes are topped with rainbow nonpareils; these Supernatural sprinkles are made with plant-based colors and are free from artificial dyes.
• 8” round cake pan
• Four (4 ounce) wide-mouth Mason jars or similar-sized ramekins
• Round biscuit cutters, 2 1/2" or 2 1/8" for a 4 ounce Mason jar; if you have a different-sized ramekin, you may need a larger or smaller cutter (No cutters? You can use your ramekin as a guide and cut out your cake rounds using a sharp knife. We don’t recommend using an upside-down ramekin as a cutter, because the edges are too dull to cut cleanly and you’ll end up with smushed cake).
• Offset spatula
• Plate/bowl for sprinkles

Photography by Patrick Marinello; food styling by Lydia Fournier

How to make a Dot Cake

1. Bake your cake and let it cool completely. An 8" cake will yield 4 Dot Cakes; if you want more, make two 8" layers or a 9" x 13" cake.
2. While the cake cools, mix a batch of frosting; you’ll need about 1 to 1½ cups for 4 dot cakes.
3. Using a round biscuit cutter that has a slightly smaller circumference than your ramekin or jar, cut out 4 small circles of cake from your 8” cake layer. Save (or eat!) the scraps. Our favorite use? Mix them into no-churn ice cream.
4. Place a cake round in each jar or ramekin, pressing it down to the bottom of the jar. Using an offset spatula, add frosting to the top of the each cake, adding enough that it reaches the top of the ramekin or jar; use the spatula to spread and flatten the frosting into an even layer level with the jar edge. For taller ramekins, you can also split a cake round in half horizontally to create a second layer of cake, then add a layer of frosting in between so the final layer of frosting isn’t too thick. 
5. Pour the sprinkles into a thick layer on a plate or small rimmed baking sheet. Invert each cake (still in its jar) onto the sprinkles, pressing so the sprinkles adhere. Note: For a true dot cake, you’re looking for edge-to-edge sprinkle coverage.
6. Dot cakes are typically served cold; transfer to the refrigerator for an hour before serving, if you’d like, or eat right away. Dot cakes are also incredibly portable, making them a viable choice for a picnic or other casual gathering.

Cover photo by Patrick Marinello; food styling by Lydia Fournier.