Try Smitten Kitchen's (Quadruple) Berry Summer Buttermilk Bundt Cake
Mine comes out darker than the original, but is just as tender and lemony
I kept seeing all kinds of berries at my local farmstand, but kept putting off the inevitable: Smitten Kitchen’s classic Triple Berry Summer Buttermilk Bundt Cake. The easy-to-follow, pantry-friendly recipe makes good use of ripe berries when you’ve run out of snack ideas.
I made this cake almost every summer when I lived in Washington state. There are only two drawbacks to making it:
It takes a long time for the bundt cake to cool before you can glaze it
To glaze it that pearly white, you must wait longer than two-three hours, or risk the dreaded translucent sheen (= failure)
Also, I’m not a great big fan of lemony-citrusy desserts, even though the lemon zest and juice of a whole lemon do a lot to break up the richness of the buttermilk cake.
Luckily, my non-stick bundt pan doesn’t need a lot of greasing beforehand.
Still, I kept putting it off. Last Thurs.-Fri., I finally gave in.
When I went to Bluerock Farmstand, there were only the last of the Oregon blueberries and about three pints of raspberries. They’d run out of blackberries.
I made a mental note to go to Costco on Mon. and settle for a chain (Driscoll), beating myself up for waiting too long. Had I gone two-three weeks ago, I’d have amazing triple berry bundt cake, overflowing with berries of all kinds.
Fate was on my side Saturday. At the last minute, I remembered another farmstand not too far away called Countryside. There, I found the juiciest blackberries ever. Those plus three strawberries that ripened in my backyard garden made for the perfect quadruple mix.
I took a little longer than I wanted adding a third of the flour mix, then half the buttermilk, then a third more of flour, the rest of the buttermilk, and the final third flour, maybe mixed it a tiny bit too long, and smooshed some berries until parts of the batter were grey.
But mostly, the bake went well.
I did the sign of the cross, as usual, before upending the baked bundt cake, after letting it cool in the pan for 30 minutes, then transferred it with a flat wooden spoon to the totable cake server.
In hindsight, I should’ve made the cake either earlier in the morning today (instead of 2:30 p.m.) or the day before. I was pushing it, waiting for the cake to cool in time for 6:30 p.m. Bible study.
It was 6:15 p.m. and the cake was still warm. I really didn’t want the translucent glaze. It’s a failure in my book.
My husband suggested I glaze the cake over at Bible study. Good idea.
It all worked out. As I got my beauty shots for Instagram, everybody went and helped themselves. There was about three generous slices left.
The cake I made was surprisingly moist. It didn’t look at all yellow and plump like Smitten Kitchen’s, but that might be the rojo (red) wheat in the Cairnspring Mills flour I use, which tints everything darker.
That lemony glaze makes it thoroughly summer, though.
If you bring it to your next potluck (or Bible Study), I guarantee there won’t be much left.
