As the air starts to crisp again and my garden’s lettuce starts to get bitter, I am looking inside for my inspiration in cooking. That often means the Internet, where I browse for ideas. Or, usually, I will have an idea and look for recipes that sound good around that idea.
My latest endeavor was looking for a birthday cake. I am not great at the traditional cakes. You know the kind that you make in two layers and have to be iced. Frankly, I don’t really like the way most of those kinds of cakes taste, either. They can be overly sweet, or dry, or just simply boring.
I tend to love bundt cakes, though. They, on the flip side, are often moist, flavorful and interesting.
For some reason I was in the mood for something toffee and found a version of the cake below online. This recipe is delicious. It is dense, creamy, has a nice crunch of toffee every other bite or so, and a thick, chewy crust. We all loved it, especially the birthday girl who was turning 30.
There is nothing tricky about following this recipe. It is easy and straightforward. The only difficult part is getting the cake out of the pan.
In the version I made, the chopped up toffee stuck to the side of the pan. It didn’t ruin the cake, but the cake didn’t have the nice-looking decorative ridges around the top that it should have. It was sort of crumbly and not very pretty. Never mind this small detail, it tasted really good.
To fix this problem, you could try to line the pan with parchment paper coated in nonstick cooking spray. If you are really diligent about prepping the pan and use a new, nonstick pan, you might have better luck than I did. I would be careful when you add the batter as the pan lining can get moved around or scraped away from the sides if you spread things around.
Be sure you cook the cake in enough time to cool completely before you serve it, as it tastes best at room temperature. I suggest serving it at room temperature and saving the rest for breakfast the next morning.
The same batter would work well with many variations. For example, add nuts if you like them. Or mix up what kind of candy bar you use. Or add chocolate chips or pieces. Whatever sounds good to you.
Try it the next time you need to make a cake. You won’t regret it, but don’t do it on a day when you need to reach a goal weight or do some sort of diet weigh-in. It tastes good for a good reason. It’s rich and full of fat.
Toffee Bundt Cake
Ingredients
- Nonstick cooking spray with flour
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 ½ cups unsalted butter, softened
- 2 cups light brown sugar, packed
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 5 large eggs
- 1 cup half and half
- 8 Heath bars, chopped
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 325 F. Spray a 12-cup bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray and dust it with flour and set aside.
- In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the butter until light and creamy. Add both sugars and beat again until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, mixing until blended. Alternate adding in flour mixture and milk, mixing until just combined, being careful not to over mix.
- Stir in toffee pieces by hand, blending well. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan.
- Bake for 75-80 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then invert onto a wire rack and removing the pan carefully to cool completely.
