butter cake, and more

I’ve already posted my current go-to recipe, and it yields a not-greasy, fine-crumbed, dry-like-a-good-tea-cake specimen of a butter cake – you can get it here.

now for some tips:

1. lining a strip of butter over the surface will help you control the crack of your butter cake – we’re talking about a 2-3mm width of butter down lengthwise. it’s not full-proof – the crack doesn’t always go where you think it should – but it does help produce a beautiful crack.
2. for a coffee marble, increase the sugar to 110g when creaming with the butter. proceed with the original recipe, but stop just before adding milk.divide the batter into two; to one half, add 0.5-1 teaspoon vanilla extract*, and to the other half, add (1 tbsp of instant coffee granules moistened with about 0.75 tbsp of water). you can up the coffee to about 1.5tbsp of granules for a stronger flavor, and remember to add milk to both batters for the magical one-thousand-two-thousand-drop.

   dollop the dark and white batters alternately, and swirl through with a knife.

   *you may omit the vanilla extract if you wish – but I think it makes for a more fragrant cake.

3. for a chocolate marble, repeat as above, but use 1 tablespoon of cocoa instead of the coffee: sift and fold into half of the batter before swirling.
4. for a durian butter cake, beat in 160-170g of durian puree (avoid the excessively fibrous bits) after you mix in the eggs, but before folding in the flour. continue as with the original recipe: fold in the flour and add enough milk till you get that plop.

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have a great rest-of-the-sunday!