Perfect Marble Cake + Video
Hello bundt cake. It's been a while.
Hello marble bundt cake. It's been never.
I can't remember the last time I made a marble cake before this one. Or ate a slice of marble cake.
If there was a buffet of cakes and one of the choices was marble cake, the marble cake would be the last one standing. It would and you know it.
Marble cakes are blah. Nothing special. Spongy swirls of vanilla and chocolate. Usually bland. Usually.
Unless we're talking about this marble cake. You see, the creator of this marble cake recipe felt the same way that I did about marble cakes. That is, she felt nothing at all.
I was happy to learn that it wasn't just me and that other people found marble cakes boring and old-fashioned too. Cleobuttera, the blogger who created the recipe for this marble cake, went to work on creating a perfect marble cake recipe after being disappointed by all the ones she had tried out in the past.
And her endeavors created this ridiculously good marble cake that has now become one of my favorite cakes ever.
Before I continue, why don't you watch this little video I made? It's about marble cake. This marble cake.
Or, watch it on Youtube.
So, what makes this marble cake so perfect? Oh, just everything.
But let's start with the taste.
Both flavor components of this marble cake, both the chocolate and vanilla sections, can easily be eaten on their own with great relish. Both are full of flavor and moisture and make for fluffy, crumbly mouthfuls.
I barely did any work on this recipe at all. I basically just tweaked the amount of sugar ever so slightly. I found the chocolate marble slightly bitter on its own and the vanilla batter just a tad too sweet. So I decreased the amount of sugar in the vanilla batter and increased the amount of sugar in the chocolate batter.
The result was an already amazing marble cake that became even more amazing.
The combination of sour cream and butter in this marble make make it extra soft and moist and tender. And let me not forget to mention the extra egg yolk, which makes the cake more rich. And the cake flour, which makes this marble cake so soft and crumbly and tender.
Starting to get a feel for how perfect this marble cake actually is? Good. Good. I'm almost done convincing you.
When I made this marble cake in the past, it came out a lot prettier. I managed to keep the chocolate and vanilla batters mostly separate instead of all swirled together, which I prefer. And I kept the outside of the cake completely free of any chocolate blotches.
But, of course, when it came time to make this cake to photograph and video it for the blog, I messed it up. The outside is blotchy. Because I allowed some of the chocolate batter to touch the sides of the pan. And the two mixtures are more swirled than I like them to be.
But I promise the cake tastes just as amazing ugly as it does pretty. I tried to hide the imperfections with a dusting of confectioner's sugar. I don't think I succeeded.
I can't stop eating this cake. Like it's actually a problem. And I can't believe I'm talking about a marble cake right now. I can't believe it's marble cake that I can't stop eating. Because I used to have a problem eating marble cake at all.
Soft. Fluffy. Tender. Moist. Rich vanilla. Rich chocolate. Slightly sticky exterior. Crumbly.
Yes, I'm talking about a marble cake right now. Marble cake. I know. It's crazy. Crazy good.
perfect marble cake
Adapted from Cleobuttera
Yield: 1 bundt cake
2 sticks butter, softened
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
2 whole eggs + 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups (8.7 oz.) packed cake flour*
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sour cream
1/4 cup milk
Chocolate Marble:
1/4 cup cocoa powder
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons milk
1 tablespoon butter
Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a medium sized bundt pan.
Cream the butter and sugar for two minutes till light and fluffy. Add in eggs, yolk, and vanilla extract and cream a few more minutes till mixture is fluffy and smooth again.
In a small bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In another small bowl, stir together the sour cream and milk. Alternate adding the dry mixture with the sour cream mixture to the machine, starting and ending with the dry ingredients. Don't over mix!
Remove 1 1/2 cups of the batter and set aside.
Chocolate Marble: Add all the ingredients to a medium bowl and heat in the microwave till butter is melted. Stir together till no longer lumpy. Then, add a dollop of the reserved 1 1/2 cups vanilla batter to the chocolate mixture and stir to combine. Add the rest of the 1 1/2 cups vanilla batter into the chocolate and fold the two mixtures together till no streaks remain.
Spread vanilla batter evenly into bundt pan. Then, run the back of a spoon all around the center of the batter, creating a tunnel. Spoon the chocolate marble into the tunnel, ensuring the sides of the pan contain only vanilla batter and no chocolate (this will make your cake look nicer on the outside when it's done baking, as only the vanilla will be visible). Finally, swirl the vanilla and chocolate together with a knife, creating "S" shapes. Again, make sure the chocolate doesn't touch the edges of the pan.
Bake cake for 40-48 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs attached.
Let cool 20 minutes before easing cake out of pan. Dust with confectioner's sugar if desired.
*Note: if you don't have cake flour, sub 210 grams all purpose flour and 40 grams cornstarch.
On a completely unrelated note, and cheesecake:
photo from dump a day dot com
