04/05/2014
Ingredients
Cake
2
boxes Betty Crocker® SuperMoist® vanilla cake mix
2
cups water
1
cup vegetable oil
6
eggs
2
packages (2.7 oz each) Betty Crocker® classic gel food colors
Buttercream Frosting
1
cup shortening
1
cup butter, softened
1
bag (2 lb) powdered sugar
2
teaspoons vanilla
3
to 4 tablespoons milk
Directions
1Heat oven to 350°F. Spray 3 (8-inch) round cake pans with cooking spray.
2In large bowl, beat cake mix, water, oil and eggs with electric mixer on low speed 30 seconds, then on medium speed 2 minutes, scraping bowl occasionally. Divide batter evenly among 6 small bowls, about 1 1/3 cups each.
3Using food colors, tint batter in 1 bowl blue, 1 bowl red, 1 bowl green, 1 bowl yellow, 1 bowl orange (using red and yellow) and 1 bowl purple (using blue and red).
4Refrigerate 3 colors of batter until ready to bake. Pour remaining 3 colors of batter into cake pans.
5Bake 18 to 20 minutes or until cake springs back when touched lightly in center and begins to pull away from side of pan. Cool 10 minutes. Remove from pans to cooling racks; cool completely.
6Wash cake pans. Bake and cool remaining 3 cake layers as directed.
7In large bowl, beat shortening and butter with electric mixer on medium speed until light yellow. On low speed, gradually beat in powdered sugar. Beat in vanilla. Add milk, 1 tablespoon at a time, beating until frosting is smooth. Beat on high speed until light and fluffy.
8Trim rounded tops off cakes to level, if needed. On serving plate, place purple cake layer. Spread with frosting to within 1/4 inch of edge. Repeat with blue, green, yellow, orange and red cake layers. Spread light coat of frosting on top and side of cake to seal in crumbs, then frost with remaining frosting.
Tips
For a deeper red color, add a teaspoon or two of unsweetened baking cocoa to the red batter If you only have two 8-inch cake pans, bake the cakes in three batches instead. For even better protection against cakes sticking to the pans, line pans with cooking parchment paper cut to fit the pan
