Nectarine Brown Butter Buckle
This cake from Smitten Kitchen (where else?!?) is AMAZING. It's the first time I've really felt the flavor and deliciousness of the browned butter shine through. According to le interweb, a buckle is a cake topped with fruit and streusel; make sure you use browned butter for that topping as well!
Cake:
1 cup cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, plus additional for greasing pan 1 1/2 cups (6 3/4 ounces or 190 grams) all purpose flour 2 teaspoons (9 grams) baking powder 3/4 teaspoon (4 grams) salt Pinch of allspice 1 cup (7 ounces or 200 grams) sugar 2 large eggs 2/3 cup whole milk or buttermilk 1 1/2 pounds nectarines, halved, pitted and cut into 1/2-inch thick wedges (about 4 cups) 1 tablespoon lemon juice Streusel Reserved butter from cake (above) 1/2 cup (3 1/2 ounces or 100 grams) sugar 1/2 cup (2 1/4 ounces or 64 grams) all purpose flour 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon Pinch of salt |
Brown your butter:
In a light colored pan (stainless steel or light enameled), melt the butter over medium-low heat, stirring frequently. The butter solids will turn a deep brown color and smell nutty and caramel-y, but keep an eye on it and reduce the heat if you feel it necessary to keep it from burning. Pour the browned butter into a bowl to cool. Prepare the cake: Preheat oven to 350°. Line the bottom of 10-inch round cake pan, or springform pan (or cast iron skillet) with parchment, then butter the parchment and all sides. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt and allspice in a large bowl, then set aside. In a medium sized bowl, whisk 1/2 cup of the cooled brown butter together with the eggs and the sugar until smooth. Stir in the milk. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until just combined, then spread into the prepared pan. Toss the nectarine wedges with the lemon juice, then shingle as many as possible on top of the batter in a pretty pattern. Stir together the remaining 1/4 cup browned butter, sugar, flour, cinnamon and salt until a clumpy mixture forms. Sprinkle mixture evenly over the top of the cake. Bake until the top is golden brown and a toothpick come out with moist crumbs, about 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes before flipping out to a plate to serve. |
Source
Notes:
Notes:
- Yes, I made this cake twice in two days, and then doubled it in a 9x13 pan for my workmates the next weekend. It's that good.
- The doubled batter was wetter than the single recipe, but still baked up beautifully. It took about 1 hr 20 mins to bake, but check often after 1 hour.
- Deb has you brown 1 1/2 sticks of butter, but I found that this rendered less than enough butter for both the cake and the streusal; I had to melt a few extra non-browned tbsp for the streusal. Here, I bumped it up to 2 sticks.