Cake is hard, not spongy cake, too hard for the plastic knife to use, so we use metal knife instead. Birthday guy was kidding "it's ice cream cake!". The sponge cake portion texture & taste is like "kway", not cake (We poke the fork into the cake ... More& the whole piece raise up just as whole piece, won't drop!) The red is very red, seem like too much coloring. Have ordered this Red Velvet cake, the more popular one from the reviews. Show less