Nana’s Butter and Egg Cake

Nana’s Butter and Egg Cake was requested for my sister-in-law Jennie’s birthday. She was coming down from New Jersey to spend her birthday weekend with us. How cool! We shall treat her like the birthday queen! A dinner request was also made, but that will be another post. (Sorry, teaser!) The special thing about this is that it was her paternal grandmother’s recipe! Oh, to relive your childhood through food memories. I have many from spending hours in my grandmother’s kitchen as well. This recipe was a bit similar to my 1-2-3-4 Cake, but used less sugar and butter. By nature, it’s texture is dense, but together with the frosting, it’s perfect.

When my husband, the middle child, and his siblings had birthdays, they were able to choose their birthday dinner and cake.  I never met my mother-in-law, so I found it fascinating that I did the same thing for our kids! According to Ellen, the eldest of the siblings, their mom would hide birthday presents and then create a series of written clues that they would have to use to find them. No matter whose birthday it was, they would all get involved in the treasure hunt.  Memories indicate the cake was originally served it with white fluffy icing made from a box mix. According to their fond recollections, Mom loved to sew, knit and crochet, but probably didn’t have the patience to prepare a boiled, 7 minute frosting,  Homemade or boxed mix really doesn’t matter, it was the love with which it was prepared. Back then, it was just more convenient. However, I could see where that would compliment the flavor of this cake well. Jennie, the youngest sibling, chose a Chocolate Sour Cream Frosting to top her birthday cake I was to prepare. It tasted like a chocolate cream cheese frosting; I could eat it by the spoonful!

So to get things started, gather your ingredients. The butter should be softened and eggs at room temperature. Beat the eggs well and set aside. Stir vanilla into the milk. When it’s available, I choose White Lily Flour. I either have to order this or drive miles to a Harris Teeter to find it. It makes amazing Fluffy Buttermilk Biscuits which were great for bacon, egg and cheese biscuits before the birthday girl ventured back home to New Jersey Sunday morning. Yum!

 

Cream the butter and sugar together, then add in the eggs and mix well.

Add flour alternatively with the milk mixture. In the end, the batter can appear a little bubbly because of it’s recent interaction with the self-rising flour. Science in action! Love it!

Grandmother and mom used a tube pan to cook the cake; I chose a fluted bundt pan because I think its cute, as well as close in size to the tube pan. I have mini-fluted pans as well which I think would be cool to use to make smaller versions maybe as a base for strawberry shortcake. Come on spring! Make sure to prep the pan with butter and flour or Baker’s Joy. Bake for 35 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Allow it to cool for about 10 minutes before inverting pan to remove cake.

Allow the cake to cool completely before you put the frosting on it.

Because the frosting had sour cream in it, I kept it in the refrigerator  until it was ready to serve. Happy Birthday, Jennie! I hope you enjoyed Nana’s Butter and Egg Cake ! Thank you for sharing your memory.