Adventures in Baking

I've never been a huge baker. Maybe it's having to get the ingredients just right with the measurements, or maybe it's the several times that I've burned myself on the side of the oven that make me a wee bit apprehensive about baking. I usually stick to brownies from a box (I swear by Ghiradelli's) or Grasshopper Squares around Christmas time (again, see boxed brownies!). Today, I decided to take a step outside of my comfort zone and combine Rick's recent request for desserts and his new found love for super foods. After seeing that Harris Teeter has both raspberries and blueberries on sale, I went searching on epicurious.com for some sort of dessert to have this weekend. I came across the recipe for the raspberry buttermilk cake and decided to substitute half of the cup of raspberries with half a cup of blueberries. I'm a little disappointed that I didn't have any parchment paper to line the 8 inch cake pan that I bought at Publix, but I did use Pam baking spray. The cake came out with ease!

And it was really good...pretty light and fluffy with the super-fruits on the bottom. I think that the next time that I make it, I may go ahead and use both whole packages of berries!

Here's the recipe:

Raspberry Buttermilk Cake
Gourmet | June 2009

Yield: Makes 6 servings
Active Time: 15 min
Total Time: 1 hr

Ingredients
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 stick unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar, divided

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 large egg
1/2 cup well-shaken buttermilk
1 cup fresh raspberries (about 5 ounces)

Directions
Preheat oven to 400°F with rack in middle. Butter and flour a 9-inch round cake pan.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Beat butter and 2/3 cup sugar with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes, then beat in vanilla. Add egg and beat well.

At low speed, mix in flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour, and mixing until just combined.

Spoon batter into cake pan, smoothing top. Scatter raspberries evenly over top and sprinkle with remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar.

Bake until cake is golden and a wooden pick inserted into center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool to warm, 10 to 15 minutes more. Invert onto a plate.

Changes I made: Used Pam baking spray instead of butter and flour for pan and used 1/2 cup blueberries and 1/2 cup raspberries