Simple Butter Cake Recipe

Butter Cake

Butter cake is a Sri Lankan dessert and tea time staple. Scones for the English and butter cake for the Sri Lankans. We love a good butter cake. By varying the quantities of ingredients, a simple butter cake can be turned into a Madeira cake or a pound cake.

As the name suggests, a butter cake includes the most basic of ingredients. Butter, eggs, sugar and flour. Taken in equal quantities. Beaten well together and baked at 180 degrees Celsius for twenty minutes. As simple as that. Too much of a trouble to turn on the oven? No problem. Just steam it. Butter cake pudding. Soft. Delicious goodness.

So here's how it goes. To make a cake of one kilo, you need 250 grams each of the ingredients, which add up to a kilo. Four large eggs or five medium ones weigh around 250g, so if you're making a cake weighing a kilo, use 4 large eggs, a cake of 500g, 2 large eggs etc. It's easy to calculate. And anyway, one extra egg will only make it more moist. yum yum. But that's the limit. :) The weight list is below.

Ingredients (For 1kg cake)
250g unsalted butter or margarine
250g castor sugar. (or just grind normal sugar into a fine power in your coffee grinder)
250g all purpose flour
4 large eggs
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla extract
A bit of butter and extra flour to prepare the cake tin

How to
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
Prepare the cake tin by greasing it with a bit of butter and lightly dusting it with a bit of flour.
Add the baking powder to the flour and sift three times.
In a large bowl Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy and all of the sugar has dissolved.
While beating the butter/sugar mixture, lightly beat the eggs, one by one in a separate bowl with a whisk and add to the butter/sugar mixture. Keep on beating until all the eggs are added and well beaten.
Add the vanilla extract and beat well.
Stop the beater. Fold in the flour little by little and mix with a spoon or a spatula. Don't over mix (Hence not using the beater). If the mixture is too thick, mix in two tablespoons of milk.
Pour into the prepared cake tin and bake for twenty minutes or until a skewer comes off clean.

p.s
If you want the cake to be even fluffier and lighter, before beating the butter, separate the eggs. Beat the whites until stiff peaks form and then the yolks. Add the stage of adding eggs, beat in the yolks first and then fold in the whites. Continue as usual.

Afterwards
Cut yourself one huge slice (or two or more) pour a cup of ginger tea, lounge with a nice book and indulge yourself. :)

You will try and tell me how it came won't you? Trust me, it's a piece of cake.

Note: On 24 Feb 2012


Ooh ooh look what made with a butter cake. :D