Making Memories in the Kitchen

My mom cooked everything for our family by following recipes in her head. We ate basic, fresh food, much of it from our farm. She was gracious with her time and let me sit, talking with her while she’d chop and stir, never asking me to help (I smile when I tell myself she liked my company that much). I’d plop down on a kitchen stool and rest my head on my hands. We’d talk so peacefully and laugh while she moved around reaching into the refrigerator bringing handfuls of food to the counter and stove. My memories of cooking are not actually cooking. They are watching her cook. They are loving her while she cooked.

With my history of sitting down to watch my mom cook instead of learning to cook, I floundered when I became a mom.  Over the years, though, as I’ve tried to make different taste buds happy on a daily basis, I’ve learned I don’t need to be deeply schooled in the kitchen to create amazing food. I have found a few delicious recipes we love and I would now argue these kinds of recipes—simple and resilient—are the best kitchen tools available.

The Easy Beginning to a Long Relationship.

I found this recipe years ago by simply googling “moist, delicious, yellow cake.” Yellow because my oldest daughter doesn’t like chocolate cakes, and moist because I am not fond of dry cakes held together by frosting toupees. I wrote the recipe down with hurried penmanship on a piece of yellow construction paper and have referred to it ever since.

What I think I love most about this cake—and why my mother would have found it a keeper—is that it’s not fussy. You likely will have everything you need on hand, and there’s no trickery. It's easy for a child to read the recipe and claim his or her first cake. Also, as is the nature of easy food, this cake is a marvelous chameleon. It once became a blue cake when our friend, coming over for her birthday told us blue was her favorite color.  When my youngest daughter helped me, the cake became bright pink with red sugar sprinkles. We’ve put strawberries between the layers and chocolate shavings on top.

Why This One Is Special: A Look Behind the Cake Curtain.

This cake has been to so many of our events, it is now a part of the family.  And it’s not surprising to me that its DNA is very close to the farm desserts I grew up with: lots of butter, some eggs, a bunch of sugar and the kicker is the buttermilk. Buttermilk in the batter offers a slight acidity that breaks down tough strands of gluten. This creates a creamier texture. And the tartness of the milk adds a very subtle, tangy taste that gives the cake a rich quality. If you don’t want to buy buttermilk, you can make your own by adding one tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice to one cup of milk. Then let it sit 10 minutes. Plain yogurt works as a buttermilk substitute too.

The cake itself is very forgiving. Once when I added too much yogurt, the cake looked like Dr. Seuss himself had been in the kitchen. The batter bubbled up on top with extra pools here and there. After a few extra minutes of baking time, we let the cakes cool and, instead of frosting one round on top of the other like a hatbox, we spooned the lumpier cake into 4-ounce Ball jars, then iced them with our favorite cream cheese frosting tinted a reddish purple color. We topped the small cakes with berries. They were photograph ready, I must say, and tasted lovely.

Large is this cake’s middle name, so you can eat your cake and have it too. It’s terrifically dense. A birthday party might manage to eat only half of the whole. You can slice up the rest and give it to your guests to take home or do as we did last summer on a nice day. We set out walking with the remaining half cake in a tin—because it even travels well—and we ended at our good friends’ house. We hadn’t called ahead, so when they answered the door we offered the cake as a double surprise. They brought out plates and glasses of milk and we stayed for more than an hour, sitting near a sunny window having fun, talking and laughing about nothing, which in the end, is one of the richest life experiences: no agenda other than friendship.

This Cake Is Community.

My children have learned lessons far beyond baking from this creamy and forgiving cake. It is a creation of instant community. Although the recipe didn’t come from my mom, her lovely kitchen karma is present when we eat it. Conversations are light and easy. Talking and listening and laughing are some of the great results of this recipe, because of the sweet common ground it creates. The same, delicious story is tasted by everybody gathered around the table.

Moist Delicious Yellow Cake

• 1 c. butter
• 2 ½ c. white sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 ½ t. vanilla extract
• 2 ½ c. buttermilk (or plain yogurt)
• 3 ¾ c. flour
• 2 ¼ t. baking powder
• 2 ¼ t. baking soda

Preheat oven to 350. Grease rounds. Sift flour, baking powder and baking soda and set aside. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Stir in vanilla. Beat in flour alternately with the buttermilk. Bake 35 to 40 minutes.

Cream Cheese Frosting

• 1 8-oz. pack cream cheese at room temp
• ¾ stick of butter at room temp
• 2 c. powdered sugar
• Grated citrus peel
• 1 t. vanilla

Beat cream cheese and butter with mixer until fluffy. Gradually add powdered sugar. Beat in citrus peel and vanilla. Refrigerate for a half-hour.

Maggie Uhl lives in Waldo with her family.