Hello friends!

Since I have written more than a few slightly embarrassing posts about my—quite glamorous—life on this lovely blog, and since I know you all read it religiously, I’ve decided that we are now on the “friend” level.  (We are friends now, so you guys can’t judge me for my terrible grammar—I’m a bioengineering major, give me a break here) And since we are all friends, I have decided to let you in on a little secret: I am addicted to farmers markets.  Before you roll your eyes and laugh at how incredibly basic/dramatic/priviledged/annoying I sound let me defend myself:

1) I had to switch it up from my normal introduction of saying hi, long time no post, complaining a little bit about my life in Texas, and making fun of my mom’s blog. Yeah. You’re welcome.

2) I grew up in Los Gatos, the land of Kate Spade bags and Tory Burch sandals, excuse me for being a little basic.

3) Farmer’s markets rock, whoever disagrees with me can hit the unsubscribe button right now.  (just kidding, my mom would kill me if that happened).

Anyways, to get back on track, I love farmer’s markets.  You can literally get a free breakfast there if you just walk up and down the stalls eating samples of fruit.

Plus, farmers markets in California during the summer are pretty much guaranteed to be sunny and filled with the prettiest, tastiest fruits and veggies EVER.  True story.  Sam came to visit over fourth of July weekend and I dragged him around the Bay Area.  Obviously, one of the first places I took him was the San Francisco Farmer’s Market at the Ferry Building.  We were on a mission to acquire 4 pounds of peaches—yes, you read that right—to make homemade peach ice cream.  The ice cream was super simple-heavy cream, sugar, vanilla, and lots of peaches.  We made it after a long day of walking around the city, so by the time it was finally frozen enough to eat, I was asleep.  I woke up just in time to watch the end of a Euro cup quarterfinal match while eating a bowl of sweet, peachy goodness.

To go along with our ice cream, I had baked up a simple berry cake from Epicurious that morning—you dot the cake with berries of your choice before sprinkling it with sugar and popping it into the oven.  As my mom says, “stupid easy”.  The sugar gives the cake a caramelized top crust, while the berries sink into the batter, giving it a warm and gooey center.  Unfortunately, the cake was forgotten over our  homemade ice cream excitement, but it was so good on its own the next day that no one minded a bit.  I tried to make the cake festive by using blueberries and raspberries to create red and blue stripes, but the berries sink in such a way that the stripes get all jumbled up.  Not worth the effort, but the cake still looked pretty great!

All in all, it was a successful weekend of food!

Stay tuned: next time I talk about my other guilty/basic pleasure: happy hour!

Hi Claire! 🙂

Print Pin

Raspberry Buttermilk Cake

Ingredients

From Epicurious

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 stick unsalted butter softened
• 2/3 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar divided
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup well-shaken buttermilk
• 1 cup fresh raspberries about 5 ounces or a mix of fresh berries

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 400°F with rack in middle.
• Butter and flour a 9-inch round cake pan or springform pan
• Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and set aside.
• Beat butter and 2/3 cup sugar with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes, then beat in vanilla.
• Add egg and beat well.
• At low speed, mix in flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour, and mixing until just combined.
• Spoon batter into cake pan, smoothing top.
• Scatter raspberries, I used a mix of berries including blueberries and blackberries and probably closer to 11/2 cups of berries) evenly over top.
• Sprinkle with remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar.
• Bake until cake is golden and a wooden pick inserted into center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool to warm, 10 to 15 minutes more. Invert onto a plate.
• Serve with whipped cream or ice cream! Yum!