This Rhubarb and Ginger Cake has layers of slightly spiced ginger cake smothered with a rhubarb buttercream frosting. Inside, silky cream cheese filling is rippled with poached rhubarb. The perfect cake to make when those coveted red stalks of rhubarb begin to arrive at the market!
Whenever I see rhubarb for the first time each season, I snatch it up like it’s gold! You never really know when it won’t be there anymore – or at least not as fresh as the stalks at the local markets. This cake is the end product of a spring time haul.
For this cake, I combined warm, spicy ginger with tantalizing, tart rhubarb. A small amount of freshly grated ginger packs a deceptive amount of flavour, quickly transforming and elevating a simple butter cake into something a bit more complex and exotic.
The rhubarb is poached in blood orange juice with more ginger and real vanilla bean seeds. Once cooked down, the tart rhubarb blends perfectly with tangy cream cheese for the filling and is an excellent contrast to the silky sweet frosting.
The vanilla-flecked buttercream becomes beautifully blushed with the natural color of the rhubarb.
Ingredients
- Cake flour
- Baking powder
- Salt
- Ground ginger
- Unsalted butter
- Granulated sugar
- Egg whites
- Vanilla extract
- Fresh ginger
- Milk
- Rhubarb
- Blood orange juice
- Vanilla bean
- Cream cheese
- Confectioners' sugar
See recipe card for quantities.
Tools and Equipment
Here are some of the important tools you will need to make this Rhubarb Ginger Cake:
- Stand mixer
- Three, 8-inch cake pans
- Saucepan
- Large mesh seive
- Small blender or food processor
- Offset spatual
- Rotating cake stand
- Piping bag and tips
- General kitchen tools (measuring spoons, spatula, etc.)
Recipe
Rhubarb and Ginger Cake
Ingredients
Ginger Butter Cake
- 3 cups cake flour
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 5 large egg whites
- 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 teaspoon fresh ginger grated
- 1 ¼ cup whole milk
Poached Rhubarb
- 3 to 3 ½ cups chopped rhubarb
- ½ cup blood orange juice
- 6 tablespoon granulated sugar
- 1 vanilla bean seeds scraped out
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger grated
Rhubarb Cream Cheese Swirl Filling
- ½ cup cream cheese softened
- ¼ cup unsalted butter softened
- 2 ½ cup confectioner's sugar
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- ¼ cup strained rhubarb
Rhubarb Buttercream Frosting
- 4 large egg whites
- 1 ⅓ cup granulated sugar
- 2 cups unsalted butter softened
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ⅓ cup rhubarb puree
- rhubarb syrup to taste
Instructions
Ginger Butter Cake
- Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare three 8-inch cake pans and set aside.
- Sift together the dry ingredients and set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, mix the butter until smooth. Add in the sugar and mix on medium for 3-5 minutes until light and fluffy. Stop the mixer and scrape down the bottom and sides of the bowl. With the mixer on low, add in the vanilla and egg whites – incorporating one at a time. Stop the mixer and scrape down the bowl.
- With the mixer on low and in alternating batches, add in the dry ingredients and milk. Mix on medium for no more than 30 seconds after all of the ingredients are added in.
- Evenly distribute the batter into the prepared pans. Bake for about 23-26 minutes or until done and a toothpick inserted in the center of the cakes comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack for 10-15 minutes before removing the cakes from their pans.
Poached Rhubarb
- Chop rhubarb into 1-inch long pieces. Place rhubarb and all of the ingredients into a medium saucepan. Place over medium-high heat and bring to a boil.
- Once the juices begin to boil, reduce to a simmer. Simmer for about 15 minutes until rhubarb breaks down and begins to thicken. Remove from heat.
- Strain the rhubarb pulp with a mesh sieve – reserving the liquids separately. Set both aside.
Rhubarb Cream Cheese Swirl Filling
- In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, mix together the cream cheese and butter until smooth.
- Add in the sugar and vanilla. Mix on low until all of the ingredients begin to come together. Turn mixer up to medium and mix until smooth. Stop the mixer and gently fold in the rhubarb.
Rhubarb Buttercream Frosting
- Puree the remaining strained rhubarb until smooth. Set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, whisk together the egg whites and sugar. Place a few inches of water in a medium saucepan and heat over medium.
- Place the mixing bowl on top of the saucepan to create a double boiler. Heat egg white mixture until it reaches 155 F degrees on a candy thermometer – or until hot to the touch. Once hot, remove the bowl and carefully return it to the electric mixer.
- Fitted with the whisk attachment, mix on high until the outside of the bowl returns to room temperature – about 8 minutes. Stop the mixer and swap out the whisk for the paddle attachment.
- With the mixer on low, add in the vanilla and butter – a couple tablespoons at a time. Turn the mixer up to medium-high and mix until smooth. Turn mixer down to medium-low and mix in the rhubarb puree until combined. Add 1-3 teaspoons of the rhubarb syrup, if desired.
Assembly
- Place one of the cake layers on a cake board or serving dish. Spread on half of the rhubarb cream cheese with an offset spatula. Top with the next layer of cake and repeat. Frost cake with rhubarb buttercream and decorate with sugar peals, if desired.
Recipe as seen in Cake Central Magazine, Sept 2015.
Joy Mills
i love rhubarb too! Tastes like spring! This cake is amazing!!
Tessa Huff
Thank you, Joy! I just stocked up on a bunch of rhubarb myself =)
Lyndsay Sung
oh the flavours!! ginger, cream cheese and rhubarb? you are a magician. PS we should POWERWALK together when the sunny weather hits again! XO
Tessa Huff
Hey gal! Sorry for the late reply. We should totally powerwalk!!
Julia Peters
Hi Tessa, this looks gorgeous. Can I ask which piping tip you used for the borders?
Tessa Huff
Hi there! Thank you!! I used a leaf tip to create the ruffles =)
Donnie Maunakea
This looks so good! rhubarb is one of my favorite things. Growing up in Vancouver, we always had rhubarb in the backyard. Now that those days are long gone and I have been living in Hawaii for 20 years, I appreciate rhubarb even more. Lucky for me there is a market that brings it in every spring and when I see it I buy it all and freeze it. I will definitely make this lovely cake!
Bree
This cake was great to celebrate the transition from winter to spring. It's a sophisticated flavor combination--about 1/2-2/3 of the kids who tried it liked it and 100% of the adults. I used carton egg whites in the cake (since they weren't being whipped) with no discernible detriment to texture and/or taste. For those terrible at estimating like me, I needed ~6 stalks of rhubarb. After a large meal, we cut small slices and served 6 adults and 11 kids with ~5 regular sized slices left over.
Tim
Rhubarb! That leaves only one more thing to say...YUM!!!
stylesweet
Yes yay! I love rhubarb season too.