Vanilla Tea Cake… the name says it all!

Week before the last, my father-in-law (who is settled in Karachi, Pakistan) called us up and said that he is coming to our place (Dubai, UAE) for a short trip of 5 days. We were both excited and started planning for his trip. But as always, the very first thing that came to my mind was (you guessed it right!!) ‘food’!! And for me, with food comes baking. Since I knew that Papa avoids creamy/ fatty stuff and that he prefers desserts, which are lighter, I decided to make a plain vanilla cake for him.

Before I dwell on more about the cake, I want to talk about one thing, which is a little out of context; whenever I bake cakes or am about to bake, my husband and me often argue over the size of the cake. Since its just the two of us living here, he wants me to bake really small cakes, something, which can be finished by us and not thrown away after reaching its expiry date. And somehow, I always end up making a minimum 8 inch cake, since i haven’t bought smaller cake pans! So, as I was saying, I planned to make a vanilla cake and since I knew that we’ll argue once again on whether to make a big or a small cake, I suddenly thought of an idea.

I had a few aluminum foil containers in my kitchen cabinet which I normally use for storing food, or for sharing food with neighbors. So I took out one medium sized container and decided to bake the cake in that! The foil container reminded me of the ‘plain cake’ (as it is usually referred to in Pakistan, or at least in my family, and is used extensively, either of the plain variety or the one with dry fruits, etc) that my Mom always used to get from the nearby bakery, to be served as refreshment in case some surprise guests came, or for that matter, to be used in fruit trifle’s layering. I suddenly had a nostalgic feeling about my family back in Karachi, my old house and the nearby bakery’s ‘plain cake’ and that got me further excited about baking in foil container.

Now, for the recipe, since I had to make a smaller cake, I decided to use the recipe of ‘Classic Yellow Cake’, which I have borrowed from my mentor Nadia’s blog and which, I normally use for making cupcakes. The only change I did to the recipe was adding yellow food color to the prepared batter and mixing it. This step I did only to make my cake look as close as the ‘bakery wala’ cake, and to my utter delight, it looked almost exactly like that!

As for the taste, it even tasted exactly like my childhood cake. The cake was light, soft, and very delicious and in the words of Papa, and I quote, “If you hadn’t mentioned that you have baked it at home, I would have certainly thought it was from some bakery.’ His compliment made me all the more excited and jubilant.

This cake serves as a perfect compliment with tea, to be used in trifles, or even to be served with chocolate ice cream and whipped cream (something which I tried, and was a hit with everyone). It stores well up to a week in a cooler kitchen, but if its hot, you can always store it in fridge and take out from the fridge 15-20 minutes before serving to bring it to room temperature. 

Do give this easy recipe a try and give me your feedback. I shall wait for your comments.

Vanilla Tea Cake

Ingredients:

Flour 1 cup
Baking Powder ¾ tsp
Salt 1/8 tsp
Milk ½ cup
Butter 1/3 cup
Castor Sugar ½ cup + 1 tbsp
Vanilla Essence ½ tsp
Egg 1

Method:

• Preheat oven at 190C (no. 5) and prepare a foil/ pan by greasing it.
• Beat butter till fluffy.
• Add sugar until well combined and creamy.
• Add in essence and beat; add in egg and beat well. 
• Sieve flour, salt and baking powder.
• Add in sifted flour alternately with milk while beating.
• Also add food color and beat.
• Pour the batter in the prepared pan.
• Bake for 25-30 minutes until golden brown.