 When I was growing up in north Jersey, I remember the milk man delivering milk to our house and there use to be a man in a panel truck filled with delicious baked goods. He would pull into the driveway and my mother would purchase wonderful crumb buns and a marble loaf cake with chopped walnuts. While I could make this cake any time, I didn't need to have it lingering on my kitchen counter testing my willpower not to indulge. However, this weekend, my daughter and son-in-law invited some friends down which gave me the perfect excuse to bake. I have a recipe by Gail Gand for Lily's Marble cake and I also had a recipe from Martha Stewart's book "Martha Stewart Baking Handbook." I've baked Gail's before and decided to give Martha Stewart's recipe a go this weekend. One difference between Ms. Gand's recipe and Ms. Stewart's is that Ms. Stewart's recipe uses cake flour, which has a lower protein content than all purpose flour. Cake flour makes for a more tender cake.
The cake came together quite easily. I had the butter at room temperature as the recipe called for. I also keep cake flour on hand and had purchased buttermilk, both called for in the recipe. Although I was following the recipe, as I was preparing the cake, I almost forgot to add the buttermilk. I was to alternate the buttermilk with the flour and end with the flour. Unfortunately, I added the buttermilk at the end. I don't think it diminished the taste of this creation, however, I did notice a crack on the top of hot cake, perhaps over beating or an over development of gluten. However, despite my error, the cake was delicious! It had a tight crumb and was moist. Fortunately, my daughter gave her guests a piece to take home, saving myself from added calories. I hope the taste of marble cake stays with me a while as does the memories.
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