Rainbow Cake, Light and Fruity Jello Cake!

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Rainbow Cake is a vintage recipe that is a family favorite! This Rainbow Cake is light, refreshing and not heavy, perfect for hot summer parties!

I don’t remember my Mom ever making any other cake for me for my birthday! I think there is picture of me in a high chair with chocolate cake all over my face, although I don’t remember! The only cake I ever remember her making is this Rainbow Cake!

It is really quite an easy recipe, but takes a bit of time and patience. Mostly just waiting for the jello to harder in every layer.

What is Jello?

Although not health food, by any means, jello has a fruity, light flavor that is unbeatable!

Jello is gluten and dairy free. It does contain quite a bit of sugar, so if you are watching your sugar, you will probably want to steer clear.

(For all of my readers outside of the US, Jello is a brand name of a gelatin that Americans are so familiar with, we just refer to it as Jello!:) It is a sweet and fruity dessert gelatin. )

What you need

• Angel food cake, homemade or store bought
• raspberry or strawberry jello
• orange jello
• lemon jello
• lime jello
• blueberry jello
• grape or black cherry jello
• Angel Food Cake Pan is required

How to Assemble Rainbow Cake

1. Slice angel food cake, horizontally into 7 slices. Keep track of the order of the slices.
2. Make red jello. Refrigerate. Let set 40-60 minutes, until partially set.
3. Just before adding red jello to cake pan, make orange jello. Refrigerate.
4. Once red jello is partially set, place the top slice of angel food cake into angel cake pan and top with jello. Add the second slice of cake on top of red jello. Refrigerate.
5. Again, just before adding the orange jello to pan, make lemon jello.
6. Repeat steps 3 and 4 with the consecutive colors, lemon, lime, blueberry and grape.
7. Place the last slice of cake on top of the grape or black cherry jello. Best to refrigerate overnight, to make sure it’s fully set.

Pro tips for success

• If your jello sets too much and your can not pour it on top of cake, you can reheat it and start the setting process again.
• Use a sharp serrated bread knife to cut the cake.
• The slices don’t have to be totally uniform but get them as close as you can.
• If you mess up a slice, start cutting from the other side of the cake, until you reach to spot where the first piece broke. Seal the pieces together with jello.
• Unless your refrigerator is set really cold, and hour in between the different colors usually works well, for timing making the jello. It gives the flavor that you just added to the cake some time to really set.

The one thing that is a must for Rainbow Cake is to have an Angel Food Cake pan. The reason for this is because you build the cake, layer by layer, in the pan.

So just a fun post, today! I hope you enjoyed this Rainbow Cake recipe! Thanks for stopping by! Like and hit those share buttons and leave me a comment to let me know your favorite birthday cake! Here is Jake’s favorite cake, Perfectly Chocolate Cake! AND…. Thanks, Mom! 🙂

Enjoy! And have fun cooking!

Rainbow Cake

Rainbow Cake is a vintage recipe that is a family favorite! This Rainbow Cake is light, refreshing and not heavy, perfect for hot summer parties!

See Step by Step Photos Above!Most of our recipes have step by step photos and videos! Also helpful tips so that you can make it perfectly the first time and every time! Scroll up to see them!

5 from 8 votes

Print Pin Rate

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Prep Time: 6 hours 10 minutes

Total Time: 6 hours 10 minutes

Servings: 12 servings

Calories: 234kcal

Author: Beth Neels

Cost: $8

Ingredients

• 1 Store bought, boxed mixed or homemade Angel Food Cake
• 1 box strawberry jello
• 1 box orange jello
• 1 box lemon jello
• 1 box lime jello
• 1 box blueberry jello
• 1 box black cherry jello or grape

US Customary – Metric

Instructions

• Mix strawberry jello according to package directions. Put in refrigerator just until  thickened, about 1 1/2 hours. 
• If using a homemade Angel Food Cake, the cake must be thoroughly cooled before you slice it.
• Slice cake horizontally as thin as you can, about 1/2" thick. (Don't panic if you break of the layers, you can just piece them together with the jello) Lay first layer, the top layer of the cake, back into your Angel food cake pan, cut side up. 
• Mix orange jello about 1 hour after you refrigerated the strawberry jello. Then refrigerate that.
• Once the strawberry jello is thickened, spoon jello over the first layer of cake and return to refrigerator.
  
• Start the lemon jello about 1 hour after you started the lemon jello.
• When the orange jello is thickened, place the next layer of cake over top of the strawberry jello in the cake pan. Spoon orange jello over the second piece of cake and refrigerate.
• Continue the process for all of the colors. Lemon, Lime, Blueberry, Black Cherry.
• Hopefully, you will be out of cake, if not, you will have to remove the cherry jello from the refrigerator, you will be able to count how many pieces of cake you cut, to determine if you have to do this step.
• Obviously, do this cake the day before you need it!

Angel Food Cake Pan

mixing bowls

Notes

Use a sharp bread knife to cut through the angle food cake. Cut all the layers before you start layering the cake. That way, you will know how many colors you need, and if you need multiple layers of the same color.

This cake has to be built in an Angel food cake pan.

If you measure the dry jello, you could do half of the box at a time, then the jello will not get too set while waiting for the current layer to set.

If, once the cake is cut, you only need one layer of a color, you are home free and can make the entire box.

Now that they have come out with a blueberry jello, you may only need 1 layer of each color.

Lay colors in the order of rainbow, namely, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet (use black cherry or grape for the violet layer.

Leftovers last for 3-4 days. As the days progress the jello will leak water and the bottom layer of cake may get soggy.

Drain additional water off of the plate daily.

 

Nutrition

Calories: 234kcal | Carbohydrates: 55g | Protein: 5g | Sodium: 342mg | Potassium: 38mg | Sugar: 45g | Calcium: 24mg | Iron: 0.1mg

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