This homemade Easter poke cake is a soft, moist, and colourful cake. Holes are poked into the baked cake, and are filled with a sweet homemade vanilla pudding. The cake is then topped with mounds of whipped cream and decorated with colourful sprinkles!
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🐥A fun, colourful, Easter cake
There are a lot of super easy versions of this cake online, but I like to bake from scratch. So I set out to create this recipe without using boxed cake mix or instant vanilla pudding! This cake was actually really easy to make, even though all the components are homemade. But if you really want to, go ahead and use that instant vanilla pudding!
This Easter poke cake starts with an easy vanilla sheet cake. You divide the batter in 4 bowls and use food colouring to colour the batter of 3 bowls. You could colour the 4th batter too. I chose to leave it uncoloured. Then layer the cake batter by dropping spoonfuls into the baking pan, alternating with colours.
After the cake is baked, poke holes in the top of the cake and drop spoonfuls of the homemade vanilla pudding down the holes. Decorate the top of the cake with sweetened whipped cream and decorate with sprinkles.
Looking for more Easter recipes? Check out Easter bunny coconut tails, Italian Easter bread, or Hot cross buns!
🥘Ingredients
Ingredient notes
- Gel Food Colouring - I recommend using gel food colouring as you only need a few drops to get the colour you need. Liquid food colours will add liquid to the batter, which we don't want, and you would need a lot to get the colour you want.
- Unsalted butter - You can use salted butter as a substitute. Omit the extra salt in the recipe.
- Whole milk - You can substitute with 2% milk. I don't recommend using a lighter fat milk that that.
🔪Instructions
Homemade Vanilla Pudding
Start with making the vanilla pudding. What's great about this recipe, is that you can make the vanilla pudding a day early. It has to chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours until it's ready to use. So make it a day early to save time.
To make the pudding, whisk cornstarch and ¼ cup of the milk together in a small bowl until well combined. Set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk egg yolk and set aside.
Combine remaining milk, granulated salt and sugar in a medium saucepan. Heat over medium heat until mixture begins to steam, then remove from heat.
Remove ¼ cup of the hot milk mixture from the saucepan and slowly pour it into the egg yolk, whisking constantly. Add the egg yolk mixture and the cornstarch mixture to the saucepan. Continue to heat over medium heat, whisking constantly, until mixture starts to simmer and has thickened.
Remove from the heat and use a fine mesh strainer to sieve it into a clean medium sized bowl. You can skip this step if you are not worried about having a super smooth pudding.
Whisk butter and vanilla into the pudding. Top pudding with a layer of plastic wrap touching the top of the pudding to prevent a skin from forming. Allow to come to room temperature, then chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.
Vanilla Cake
This vanilla sheet cake is very easy to make. Start by whisking flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
Beat butter and sugar together in a large bowl until well creamed together, about 2 minutes of mixing. Add sour cream and vanilla. Mix well until incorporated. Then mix in eggs, one at a time, until fully mixed in. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.
Add dry ingredients to the batter in 3 parts, alternating with the milk, and starting and ending with the dry ingredients. Mix until just combined. Divide batter into 4 small bowls. Use gel food colouring to colour 3 of the divided batters.
Drop spoonfuls of the batter throughout the prepared baking pan, alternating the colours. I suggest dropping one coloured batter at a time, leaving a few inches between the drops, then make drops with the second colour, then the third, then the fourth batter, until you cover the bottom of the baking dish. Then drop another layer on top until you use up all the batter.
Drop the baking dish lightly on the counter to flatten the cake layers. Then use a toothpick to gently run through the colours twice. Don't over mix. Bake for 30-33 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out with a few moist crumbs on it. Let cool completely on a wire rack.
Whipped Topping and Assembly
To make the whipped topping, whisk heavy whipping cream, powdered sugar, and vanilla together in a stiff bowl, until you have stiff peaks.
Use the end of a wooden spatula, or something of equal size, to poke holes all over the top of the cooled cake. Make sure to poke holes about ½" into the cake. Spoon vanilla pudding into each of the holes to make sure they are filled up. Then spread a layer of vanilla pudding on top of the cake.
Spread whipped topping on top of the cake, and decorate with sprinkles. Store leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.
✔️Expert tips
- Make the vanilla pudding a day in advance to save time.
- Make sure to chill the vanilla pudding for at least 2 hours.
- Use a store bought vanilla pudding mix if you don't want to make it (but I assure you it's really easy and tastes amazing!)
- Don't overmix the cake batter. Mix the food colouring in just until it is fully mixed in.
- Make sure to poke holes in the cake at least ½" deep.
- Instead of sprinkles, add chocolate eggs, marshmallow peeps, or any other kind of colourful decoration!
💭FAQs
You can make the vanilla pudding a day or two in advance. Store in the refrigerator with plastic wrap touching the surface of the pudding. Use another piece of plastic wrap to cover the top of the bowl.
You can freeze the sheet cake after it has been baked and cooled. Store in the freezer for up to 3 months. Thaw at room temperature overnight.
The holes were poked too close together. You don't want the holes too far apart though either, or the cake won't have enough filling. Poke holes in the cake ½" to 1" apart.
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Homemade Easter Poke Cake
Equipment
- one 9x13" baking pan
Ingredients
Vanilla Pudding
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 cup whole milk divided
- 1 egg yolk
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon unsalted butter
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Vanilla Cake
- 3¼ cups all purpose flour
- 1½ teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 1½ cups granulated sugar
- ⅓ cup sour cream room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 3 large eggs room temperature
- 1 cup whole milk room temperature
- gel food colouring blue, pink, yellow, green
Whipped Topping
- 2 cups heavy whipping cream cold
- ¼ cup powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
Vanilla Pudding
- In a small bowl, whisk cornstarch and ¼ cup of the milk together until well combined. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, whisk egg yolk and set aside.
- Combine remaining milk, granulated salt and sugar in a medium saucepan. Heat over medium heat until mixture begins to steam. Do not let it get to boiling point. Remove from heat.
- Remove ¼ cup of the hot milk mixture from the saucepan and slowly pour it into the egg yolk, whisking constantly. Add the egg yolk mixture and the cornstarch mixture to the saucepan.
- Continue to heat over medium heat, whisking constantly, until mixture starts to simmer and has thickened.
- Remove from the heat and use a fine mesh strainer to sieve it into a clean medium sized bowl. You can skip this step if you are not worried about having a super smooth pudding.
- Whisk butter and vanilla into the pudding. Top pudding with a layer of plastic wrap touching the top of the pudding to prevent a skin from forming. Allow to come to room temperature, then chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours. The pudding can easily be made a day in advance.
Vanilla Cake
- Preheat oven to 350° (180°C). Generously grease a 9x13" baking dish.
- In a medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together. Set aside.
- Beat butter and sugar together in a large bowl until well creamed together, about 2 minutes of mixing.
- Add sour cream and vanilla. Mix well until incorporated. Then mix in eggs, one at a time, until fully mixed in. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.
- Add dry ingredients to the batter in 3 parts, alternating with the milk, and starting and ending with the dry ingredients. Mix until just combined. Divide batter into 4 small bowls. Use gel food colouring to colour 3 of the divided batters.
- Drop spoonfuls of the batter throughout the prepared baking pan, alternating the colours. I suggest dropping one coloured batter at a time, leaving a few inches between the drops, then make drops with the second colour, then the third, then the fourth batter, until you cover the bottom of the baking dish. Then drop another layer on top until you use up all the batter.
- Drop the baking dish lightly on the counter to flatten the cake layers. Then use a toothpick to gently run through the colours twice. Don't over mix. Bake for 30-33 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out with a few moist crumbs on it. Let cool completely on a wire rack.
Whipped Topping
- In a large bowl, whisk heavy whipping cream, powdered sugar, and vanilla together until you have stiff peaks.
- Use the end of a wooden spatula, or something of equal size, to poke holes all over the top of the cooled cake. Make sure to poke holes about ½" into the cake.
- Spoon vanilla pudding into each of the holes to make sure they are filled up. Then spread a layer of vanilla pudding on top of the cake.
- Spread whipped topping on top of the cake, and decorate with sprinkles. Store leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.
Notes
- Make the vanilla pudding a day in advance to save time.
- Make sure to chill the vanilla pudding for at least 2 hours.
- Use a store bought vanilla pudding mix if you don't want to make it (but I assure you it's really easy and tastes amazing!)
- Don't overmix the cake batter. Mix the food colouring in just until it is fully mixed in.
- Make sure to poke holes in the cake at least ½" deep.
- Instead of sprinkles, add chocolate eggs, marshmallow peeps, or any other kind of colourful decoration!
Did you try this recipe? Comment below to let me know ☺️