Yellow Birthday Cake {almond & coconut flour}

This yellow cake recipe originally appeared in my first cookbook, and I circled back to it in May of 2025 to make it a bit sweeter and adjust some of the ingredients. It's a nice alternative to my yellow cake recipe that uses just almond flour.

This recipe is from my early days of recipe writing when I just began experimenting with grain-free flours. I wanted to create a birthday cake for my young son who wanted so badly to have a piece of cake at parties and celebrations, but his body wouldn't cooperate.

Almond and coconut flours are combined to give you a light, airy, classic yellow cake texture that's ready for any frosting, cream, or other topping you can dream up. Almost all the ingredients are the same, but some of the amounts have changed. And I added baking powder to it but it bakes well without baking powder. If you don't want to use baking powder, just leave it out. Or, you can also use a ½ teaspoon of baking soda instead of a ¼ teaspoon, and leave out the baking powder. I've tested all three ways, and the cake comes out great in every way! The baking powder gives it a slightly better rise.

The only thing to be aware of is that baking powder tends to have starch and aluminum added to it. You can find baking powder that is free of both these ingredients when searching online. I haven't tried it yet, but New England Cupboard makes a starch-free baking powder with no additives.

Be sure to read the recipe notes. I added a great tip on how to prepare a baking pan or springform pan so you get the best rise out of your cake. Enjoy!