whine & dine

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I feel like I’ve been on some perpetual search for the elusive perfect cake most of my life. To me, it should be moist, but with a light, tender crumb. The buttery richness shouldn’t be outweighed by a heavy handed baker adding too much sugar, the eggs should give it a beautiful golden hue. There should be enough flour to give it structure and density, but not so much that it becomes leaden, dense or dry. A playful whiff of vanilla would be a fantastic foundation, and perhaps a citrusy glaze or an asymmetrical marbling of chocolate to build the complexity of flavours never hurt. But the search is over.

Having been sorely disappointed by one too many store-bought cake slices, I usually end up baking a cake for myself when the craving strikes. Some days, I’ll want to experiment; to trawl through my cookbooks for one of the earmarked recipes, but often it’s the familiar that I crave. When I’m in the mood for the latter, it’s my favourite cake that I invariably turn to – blondies. It is perfect on its own, doused liberally in a butterscotch or salted caramel sauce, yet somehow that perfection is surpassed when topped with a generous quenelle of home-made ice cream. The best part? It’s really simple and quick to whip up – it takes about 30 minutes to whip up the batter, and in the time it takes to bake, the dishes miraculously clean themselves, and you still have enough time to make the sauce. Really, the hardest part is waiting for the cake to cool and for the golden crumb to swell and soak up the caramel sauce.

And of course, it goes perfectly with that afternoon cup of tea. Hits the spot, every single time.

The only thing about baking an entire cake is that if I don’t want to gorge on an entire 9-inch, double-layered cake within the fleeting window when it remains at the height of perfection, it generally means there’ll be a distribution run to a bunch of happy friends. And after the last gazillion requests I’ve received for this particular recipe from said sticky-fingered recipients of the leftovers, I figured it was high time I just posted it up here. That way, the rest of you can enjoy it too. :)

PS: Sorry for the slightly long break I took between posts – I’ve been in and out of the country, and have had visitors in town (the HK Sevens was this weekend!), and also somehow managed to catch bunny’s non-contagious sinus infection. I have a couple more posts in my draft folder so will try to bang those out once I get a couple of minutes to breathe.

Blondies
(Adapted from Sherry Yard’s The Secrets of Baking)

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
6 oz unsalted butter, softened
65g caster sugar
1 cup packed light brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp light corn syrup
1 tbsp vanilla extract
200g chopped toasted pecan halves (optional)
1 cup Salted Butter Caramel sauce (recipe below)

Preheat the oven to 175°C. Adjust the rack to the centre of the oven. Grease a 9×13 inch baking pan and line the base with greaseproof paper. Grease the paper.

Triple sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a medium bowl and set aside.

Using a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter on high speed until soft and creamy (about 1 minute). Slowly add the sugars and beat on high speed until fully incorporated and the mixture is light and fluffy (about 10 minutes). Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed.

Add the eggs, one at a time. Be sure each egg is completely incorporated and scrape down the sides of the bowl before adding the next one. Add the corn syrup and vanilla.

Slowly add the dry ingredients and mix on low speed until just combined.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and smooth the top. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Poke holes in the surface of the cake with a skewer or fork. Pour the caramel sauce over the cake. Let the cake cool in the pan on a rack, then cut into 2-inch squares before serving.

The blondies will last wrapped airtight at room temperature for 3 days, or frozen for up to 3 weeks, but frankly they never survive that long around my house. :)

Yield: About 2 dozen 2-inch squares

Salted Butter Caramel Sauce
(Adapted from David Lebovitz‘s The Perfect Scoop)

85g unsalted butter
150g sugar
250ml heavy cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp coarse salt (fleur de sel)

Melt the butter in a large, deep, heavy-based saucepan or Dutch oven. Stir in the sugar and cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the sugar is a deep golden brown and starts to smoke.

Remove pan from the heat and immediately whisk in half of the cream and stir until smooth. (Wear an oven mitt since the mixture will steam and splatter, and may bubble furiously.) Stir in the rest of the cream, then the vanilla and salt. If there are any lumps of caramel, whisk the sauce gently over very low heat until they have been dissolved. This sauce can be stored in the refrigerator for 2 weeks. Rewarm it gently in a microwave or by stirring in a saucepan over very low heat.

Yield: Makes about 1.5 cups (so you can either just dump it ALL over the cake, or save the remainder for drizzling a little extra over the cake when you serve it. I am lazy and normally just opt for the former.)