Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Place all dry cake ingredients in a large mixing bowl and mix together with a wire whisk until well blended.

Add the remaining cake ingredients and beat on medium speed for 2 minutes.

Pour batter into 3 greased and lined 9" cake pans. Lightly tap cake pans on counter to bring up air bubbles and level out batter.

Bake until cake tests done (about 20 minutes, keep a close on them so they don't overcook).

For Raspberry filling:

In a medium saucepan, combine all of the ingredients and slowly bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly until thickened.

Remove from heat and let cool completely before constructing cake. Reserve 1/2 cup for decorating top of cake before moving on to next steps.

To construct cake:

Make a double batch of the Amazing Vanilla Frosting.

Make sure cake layers are COMPLETELY cool (you can even freeze them a bit to make them extra easy to work with) and top with 1/2 of the completely cooled raspberry filling (minus the reserve).

Frost the second layer with vanilla frosting and carefully flip on top of the first layer.

Top the second layer with the remaining 1/2 of the raspberry filling.

Frost the third layer with vanilla frosting and carefully flip on top of the first layer.

Frost the entire cake with the remaining vanilla frosting, decorating as you wish. If you want to create the raspberry center top, use a 4-5" bowl to press a circle into the top of the cake as your guide. (You may want to do this after you've refrigerated the cake for an hour or so. This way the raspberry filling will spread more solidly on top of the icing.)

The main picture doesn't show it, but I also pressed toasted slivered almonds on the sides of the cake. Not an easy process (put in your palm and jam it on the sides, and doing it after you've had a few beers helps so you're not too picky about the results), but it adds an additional texture to the cake.