Recipe: Strawberry Cake

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I’ve written before on our Recipe site about how cooking to me is an act of love. I love inviting people over for a meal, dropping off a meal on someone’s doorstep that might need it, or baking something sweet to celebrate…well anything!

When Adam left GFE I made my favorite Almond Cake. I wrote “To me, food cooked with love an intention is more than just a few tablespoons of this and a few cups of that. It's the stirring and the smelling, the slicing and the folding, the oven peaking - when all of these things done with intention, you really can taste the love.”

I’m not sure if it’s this sunny weather, missing the people I care about (outside of the lovelies I live with), or feeling that springtime yearning for something sweet but as I close out my 8th week at home, I am feeling the need for a new kind of self care. I’ve done yoga, and zoomed with family and friends, and taken baths and all that. But this weekend I want to bake myself a little love.

Last year, on our beloved GFE Garden Educator Hana’s birthday, I made my favorite Strawberry Cake from the venerable Deb Perlman of Smitten Kitchen. She got the recipe from Martha Stewart and I have seen this recipe posted and gushed about on many platforms since. It is my favorite kind of no-fuss cake. No frosting or layers or complicated drizzles. Just delicious fruit, buttery batter and perfect simplicity. I have made it with both barley flour and white flour, and while both are delicious, if you have some barley flour, it really takes this up a notch.

Strawberry Summer Cake
From smittenkitchen.com

  • 6 tablespoons (85 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus extra to grease the baking dish

  • 1 1/2 cups (188 grams) all-purpose flour or half all purpose flour, half barley flour

  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

  • 1/2 teaspoon salt

  • 1 cup (200 grams) plus 2 tablespoons (25 grams) granulated sugar

  • 1 large egg

  • 1/2 cup (118 ml) milk

  • 1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract

  • 1 pound (450 grams) strawberries, hulled and halved (or you can even quarter if they are especially big)

Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C). Butter a 10-inch pie pan, a 9-inch deep-dish pie or a 9 inch springform pan.

Whisk flour or flours, baking powder and salt together in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, beat butter and 1 cup sugar until pale and fluffy with an electric mixer, about 3 minutes (I find this to be a crucial step in cake making - don’t rush pas this part!). Mix in egg, milk and vanilla until just combined. Add dry mixture gradually, mixing until just smooth.

Pour into prepared baking pan. Arrange the strawberries, cut side down, on top of the batter, as closely as possible in a single layer (squeezing them into the cracks if necessary). Sprinkle the remaining 2 tablespoons sugar over berries. (You can always taste your berries and adjust depending on sweetness. Spring berries like we are getting right now tend to be a bit tart.)

Bake cake for 10 minutes then reduce oven temperature to 325°F and bake cake until golden brown and a tester comes out free of wet batter, about 50 minutes to 60 minutes. Let cool in pan on a rack. Cut into wedges.

You can always serve this with whipped cream or ice cream if you like. I love it in the afternoon with a cup of tea.

this is wonderful for a special occasion but I am giving you permission to make it for no occasion at all!

this is wonderful for a special occasion but I am giving you permission to make it for no occasion at all!