Meet The Queen Of Cakes The Red Velvet cake is thought to have originated in Maryland in the early 20th century. In the 19th century, "velvet" cake, a soft and velvety crumb cake, came to be served as a fancy dessert, in contrast to what had been the more common, coarser-crumbed cake. Around the turn of the 20th century, Devils foods Cake was introduced, which is how some believe that red velvet cake came about. The key difference between the two cakes is that devil's food cake uses chocolate and the red velvet cake uses cocoa.