Strawberry shortcake is one of my all time favorite desserts.  Growing up my mom would buy packages of little yellow shortcakes.  As an adult watching ingredients, I can't bring myself to buy them.  I've tried all different kinds of biscuit-type shortcakes, but nothing was quite the same as those little yellow cakes.

I had an “ah ha” moment a few weeks ago when I realized I could use CAKE for the short cake! I'm not sure what it took me years to figure that out.  At first I thought I'd try yellow cake, but I decided to use a French vanilla cake instead.  And then in a moment of nostalgic weakness I bought a shortcake maker (which, by the way, is the only thing I've ever found that is NOT available on Amazon.com!).

And it made these adorable little shortcakes! I LOVE THEM!

But this pan would work, too.  Because you need a pan/gadget that's useful for one thing only, right? But it's FUN!

Oh, wait, you can get 3 of these for the same price! Not as cute, but definitely more efficient since you can bake more than six at a time if you have 2-3 pans.

ANYWAY, my point is that you can easily make your very own shortCAKES at home!  If you don't have or want a fancy pan, just bake the cake in a square 8×8 or 9×9 pan and cut in to squares.  This cake recipe I used is to die for. It is so good it's ridiculous. I can't wait to use it as cake, cake.

Yield: 12

Strawberry Shortcake

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Ingredients

• 1 lb (give or take) strawberries
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 stick butter at room temperature
• 1 cup white sugar
• 2 eggs at room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups plus 2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
• Scant 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 heaping Tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
• Heavy whipping cream

Instructions

2. Slice strawberries and place in a bowl.
3. Sprinkle with sugar and stir. Set aside. (Can be made days ahead)
4. In a small bowl whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
5. In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream butter for 3 minutes.
6. Add sugar and cream for 3 more minutes.
7. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating to incorporate each time.
8. Add flour mixture and milk, alternating, starting and ending with flour mixture. Mix well between each addition.
9. Add vanilla and mix.
10. Bake shortcakes according to pan or maker instructions.
11. (In the maker, I used 2 Tablespoons of cake batter. The first batch took 8 minutes, the next took 5 and the time went down every batch after that.)
12. Set shortcakes aside to cool. Store in air tight container.
13. For whipped cream: beat in a stand mixer with sugar and vanilla extract to desired taste for 1-2 minutes.
14. To serve: layer strawberries and juice on top of shortcakes. Dollop with whipped cream.

This post contains Amazon.com affiliate links, however, I bought the strawberry shortcake maker myself! All opinions are 100% my own.