This post has been sponsored by my friends at Rodelle, thank you for supporting the brands that support Olive and Artisan.
Oh, it’s that time of the year, isn’t it? When we put on chunky tights and get melancholy. There’s something about October. It hits us like a ton of bricks. After a sunny 80 degree day, we wake up against foggy windows, and spiced candles with the urge to get in that kitchen and warm the house with a preheated oven.
I’ve been baking snack cakes lately. Something about their size and ease that I love. When you can just cut a square and pick it up between your thumb and index finger. No real need for a plate, or an occasion for that matter. If you have kids, this is a great way to greet them at the door after school. If you’re watching the first scary movie night of the season, this is a perfect thing to have on the ottoman, perfectly in reach for everybody.
This one has been a favorite. It’s a Vanilla Spiced Snack Cake. I tested it with on my stories a few weeks back on Instagram. The goal was to make a vanilla forward cake that’s soft and easy to hold. We always fail first, that’s the rhythm. But thankfully, I kept trying and this perfectly dense, yet light cake appeared. More spices than you think would be necessary for a cake of this size. Which I think is necessary when making a bite sized cake. All the vanilla and ginger and cloves flavors are packed forward. You miss nothing here, you won’t even miss the fork and plate.
When making a cake like this it’s paramount the ingredients you use are always of the highest quality. From how they’re harvested to the quality you taste. Rodelle’s Fair Trade Vanilla extract hits all those check marks. With a vertical supply chain, Rodelle can work straight with the vanilla farmers to get them fair market price.
This cake is made with part all-purpose flour and part cake flour so that you have a nice small crumb. Cake flour is not cake mix. It’s a flour that has a lower protein content than all purpose. Since it has less protein, it reduces the gluten production making the cake less chewy and more soft. Think about cutting into the center of a traditional cupcake and how it folds onto itself before you can make a clean cut. That’s because the gluten has made it stretchy and strong. For this cake, I wanted our teeth’s to sink into it without any bounce back.
Another method that helps us get that consistency is using reverse creaming. Reverse creaming means that instead of creaming the butter and sugar together before adding the eggs and then alternating dry ingredients with the milk (the way we’re all used to), we’re going to mix the butter with the dry ingredients until it forms a sandy looking consistency. This helps reduce the amount of gluten production because it coats the dry ingredients giving the flour less time exposed to the wet ingredients. And the more time flour is exposed to moisture, the more time the gluten has to develop.
And there you have it! The rest of the directions are down below in the recipe card. I hope you get a chance to try this one out. And head over to Rodelles websites and check out their full line of Fair Trade Vanilla.
Vanilla Spiced Snack Cake
Meant to be eating with your hands, this cake is spiced with all the warm spices and served with the perfect browned butter cream cheese frosting.
- Prep Time: 45
- Cook Time: 1 hour 45 minutes
- Total Time: 2 hours 30 minutes
- Yield: 16 1x
- Category: Cake
Ingredients
1 cup (120 g) cake flour
1 cup (120 g) all-purpose flour
½ (6 g) teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (200 g) granulated sugar
¼ cup (50 g) packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon cardamom
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon ginger
½ cup (113 g) butter, room temperature
1 cup (225 g) buttermilk
1 egg
3 tablespoons (42 g) vegetable oil
1 tablespoon (20 g) molasses
1 tablespoons Rodelle Fair Trade Vanilla Extract
For the frosting,
½ cup (91 g) cream cheese, softened
¼ cup (57 g) butter, browned
1 teaspoon Rodelle Fair Trade Vanilla Extract
1 ½ (150 g) cups powdered sugar
Instructions
For the cake,
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Grease and line an 8-inch square pan.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, sift the cake flour, all-purpose flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, brown sugar, and spices. Add in the butter and mix on low until the butter has coated the dry ingredients and looks like beach sand.
In a medium bowl, whisk the buttermilk, egg, oil, molasses and vanilla extract.
Pour half of the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix on low until the dry ingredients have soaked up all the wet. With the mixer still on, slowly pour in the rest of the wet ingredients. After the wet ingredients are incorporated, turn the speed up to medium/low and mix for 1 minute. That batter will start to look glossy and fluffy.
Spread the batter into the prepared pan and evenly distribute the cake around the edges. Place in the preheated oven to bake for 33-35 minutes or until the center has set. Remove from the oven to cool for about 30 minutes.
For the frosting,
Remove the browned milk solids in the browned butter by sifting through a fine sieve. In a stand mixer with a beater attachment, mix the cream cheese, browned butter and vanilla until combined and smooth. Add in the powdered sugar and mix until it becomes a fluffy frosting.
Spread on the top of the cooled cake. cut into 16 small squares and enjoy!
The spices are left out of the recipe. Looking forward to making this!
This looks so delicious Karlee! I just love the sound of a snack cake – so fun and inviting. Beautifully done!
★★★★★
Thank you!! It’s my favorite this season. I’ve updated the recipe with the missing spices!
Karlee
Quick question… 6g of salt is 1 teaspoon. How much should I used in this recipe. Could you please clarify if it’s 1/2 or 1 teaspoon. Thank you!
Sorry I have another question lol.
Regarding the brown butter… do you want it strained and then brought back to room temp? I assume the butter can’t be warm… Thank you!!!