Many cake mixes in a box are “accidentally” vegan.
They don’t contain any dairy, so as long as you use a vegan egg alternative and plant-based milk, you’re good to go.
None of Betty Crocker’s cake mixes are certified vegan, or even clearly vegan, but some of the mixes may be vegan.
I’ve gone through the ingredients for all the different mix flavors to see which ones might be vegan (a few are clearly not).
There are 3 main types of mixes that Betty Crocker makes, so I’ve divided the results into those categories:
- Super Moist Delights
- Super Moist Favorites
- Other Specialty Mixes
Table of Contents
Potential Non-Vegan Ingredients in Betty Crocker Mixes
Some of the mixes contain nonfat milk, that’s the only obvious animal ingredient in any of the mixes.
However, all the other mixes contain at least one ingredient that may or may not be vegan.
You’ll need to decide if you’d like to take the risk when deciding whether or not to purchase one.
Here are the potential problem ingredients:
- Artificial colors (e.g. “color added”, yellow 6, red 40, etc.) – Artificial colors are often tested on animals, so many vegans avoid them.
- Monoglycerides – These are derived from fats and can come from either plant or animal sources, so monoglycerides may or may not be vegan depending on where they come from.
- Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate – This can come from either plant or animal sources, so sodium stearoyl lactylate in these cake mixes may or may not be vegan.
- Sugar – Some sugar in North America is made using bone char and isn’t vegan.
- Natural flavor – This is an umbrella term covering many ingredients. Most natural flavors are vegan, but not all of them are.
That’s quite a few ingredients that may or may not be vegan.
Because most flavors contain more than one of those, there’s quite a high chance that some part of the cake mixes aren’t vegan.
Again though, it’s your choice about what you feel is reasonable in cases like this where it’s not clear.
Super Moist “Delights” Cake Mixes
Here’s a list of all the flavors in this product line:
- Butter Pecan
- Carrot
- Cherry Chip
- Dark Chocolate
- French Vanilla
- German Chocolate
- Lemon
- Rainbow Chip
- Red Velvet
- Spice
- Strawberry
- Triple Chocolate Fudge
None of them contain milk, which is good news.
However, they all contain nearly identical ingredients, and all of the following potentially non-vegan ingredients:
- Sugar
- Distilled Monoglycerides
- Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate
- Artificial Colors
- Natural Flavor
The “Super Moist Delights” line of Betty Crocker mixes MIGHT be vegan-friendly but probably aren’t. Since they all have 5 ingredients that may come from animal sources, the chances that at least one of them is NOT vegan-friendly is high.
Super Moist “Favorites” Cake Mixes
Most of these flavors are clearly NOT vegan, because they have milk:
- Vanilla
- Golden Vanilla
- Butter Recipe Yellow
- Yellow
- White
- Milk Chocolate
However, there are 3 other flavors in the “favorites” product line that don’t have milk:
- Butter Recipe Chocolate
- Chocolate Fudge
- Devil’s Food
In those 3, there are no artificial colors, however, they do still have some potentially non-vegan ingredients:
- Sugar
- Distilled Monoglycerides
- Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate
- Natural Flavor
Most of the Super Moist Favorites flavors contain milk and are clearly not vegan. Even the ones that don’t contain milk have a relatively high chance of having at least one ingredient that is sourced from animals.
Other Betty Crocker Cake Mixes
Finally, Betty Crocker has a handful of specialty cake mixes.
These have fairly unique ingredients, so I looked through each ingredient list and pulled out the ones we’re interested in.
Cake Mix | Potentially Non-Vegan Ingredients |
Angel Food Cake | Egg White |
Confetti Angel Food Cake | Egg White |
Gingerbread Cake | Sugar, Molasses, Natural Flavor |
Pineapple Upside Down Cake | Sugar |
Pound Cake Mix | Sugar, Distilled Monoglycerides, Artificial Color |
Most of these aren’t surprising, after all, most angel food cakes in general aren’t vegan.
I’ll try to keep this page up to date if Betty Crocker changes up their mixes, but if you’d like to double check, you can find all the ingredient information for mixes on Betty Crocker’s cake mix product page.
Of all the Betty Crocker Cake Mixes, the gingerbread, pineapple upside down, and pound cake mixes are most likely to be vegan.