Butter Cake: A Must-Try for Beginner Bakers

Bakery lovers, this one's for you: an easy, pound-size butter cake recipe. The cake has a lovely buttery aroma and a soft, moist crumb that warms the heart, perfect for cake lovers and a must-try for beginner bakers.

What Is Butter Cake?

Butter cake is the butter-based member of the three main cake types, and its batter is the heaviest because it contains quite a lot of butter. Fewer air bubbles form in the batter as it is mixed, so the baked cake has a fine, dense crumb, ideal for butter cake, marble cake or chocolate cake. Because butter cake is denser and heavier than other cakes, it is well suited to carrying the weight of other ingredients, as in fruit cake, which contains plenty of small pieces of dried fruit such as raisins, dates and cherries. If you add these to a lighter cake, the crumb can't support them: they sink to the bottom of the tin instead of being spread through the cake, and their weight presses down on the light crumb so it doesn't rise as it should during baking. Generally, butter cake is made by creaming butter and sugar until fluffy, beating in the eggs, then adding the flour and remaining ingredients.

Butter Cake Ingredients

• 3 eggs
• 3 tbsp fresh milk
• 1½ tbsp vanilla extract
• 150 g cake flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• A pinch of fine salt (omit if using salted butter)
• 185 g butter
• 3/4 cup sugar

How to Make Butter Cake

1. Add the milk and vanilla to the eggs and beat until just combined.
2. Sift the cake flour, baking powder and salt together.
3. Put the flour into a mixing bowl, add the sugar and mix with the paddle attachment on the lowest speed until combined.
4. When the dry ingredients are well mixed, add the butter and beat with the paddle on low, then increase to medium speed until the butter is fluffy. (Don't beat for long: overbeating the butter and flour can make the mixture tough and the cake heavy and dull.)
5. Gradually pour in the egg mixture a little at a time, beating until smooth.
6. Grease a square tin, line it with baking paper and spoon in the batter.
7. Bake with top and bottom heat at 150°C for a small oven, or 200°C for a large oven, for about 25 to 30 minutes.
8. Remove the cake from the tin, cut into pieces and serve.