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    Home » Amish Breakfast

    Amish Nut Cake

    Published: Apr 14, 2020 · Updated: Oct 5, 2020 by Kevin Williams | 10 Comments

    By Kevin Williams

    I was going to call this quarantine cake.  It's really a delicious creation and it only has six ingredients.  This recipe is a classic example of a "bare cupboard" cake. Amish cooks are terribly talented at whipping something tasty up out of almost nothing. And six ingredients is almost nothing.  I've seen this recipe in many Amish cookbooks over the years so I thought the girls and I would try making it.  With a 3 and a 6-year-old, six ingredients is about right for us.  Aster, who is six, can pretty much do anything in the kitchen, so I could try something more complicated with her, but with Beatrice in the mix, we pretty much have to stick with "stir and bake" recipes.

    Let's look at it in photos first:

    This is the cake "naked" some out of the oven...it is definitely not the prettiest cake and I thought I had done something wrong with the pock-marks in it, but once the topping was added, all was fine.

     

    Stirring up the nut topping....

    A dollop of whipped cream makes this cake outstanding.

    One step that tripped me up - and always trips me up - is how much to soften the butter.  Melted butter is easier to work with but doesn't always conform with the science of baking.  Neither, though, does a solid stick.  I'd just make sure you use very soft, room temperature butter.  Mine was still too cool and that let to more lumps of butter than I would have liked in the cake.

    Amish Nut Cake
     
    Print
    Ingredients
    • ½ cup butter softened
    • 2 cups brown sugar
    • 2 cups buttermilk
    • 2 teaspoons baking soda
    • 3 cups all-purpose flour
    • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
    • Nut Topping:
    • 6 tablespoons butter softened
    • 4 tablespoons milk
    • 1 cup brown sugar packed
    • ½ cup chopped walnuts
    Instructions
    1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
    2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
    3. Add the buttermilk and baking soda. Mix well.
    4. Add in the flour and vanilla. Mix until combined.
    5. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes or until the center bounces back when you touch it.
    6. While the cake is baking, make the topping. In a bowl, combine the butter, milk, brown sugar and nuts. Mix well.
    7. Spread this mixture all over the top of the warm cake.
    8. Place under the broiler (turned to low) and bake for 1-3 minutes or until the nut topping is bubbling.
    9. Remove from the oven and allow the cake to cool.
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    « Canadian Food Fun: Butter Tarts and Butter Tart Muffins
    Weekly Blogroll: Amish Teens and Youth, Whole Wheat Batter Bread, Rhubarb-Custard Pie, Checkers, and More! »

    About Kevin Williams

    Hi, my name is Kevin Williams and I am owner of Oasis Newsfeatures and editor of The Amish Cook newspaper column.

    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    1. Barb

      April 15, 2020 at 5:02 pm

      What size pan did you use for this?

      Reply
      • Kevin

        April 15, 2020 at 9:59 pm

        9 X 13, sorry for the omission!

        Reply
    2. Pat Markley

      April 15, 2020 at 5:12 pm

      9X13 pan I guess?

      Reply
      • Kevin

        April 15, 2020 at 9:58 pm

        Yes, sorry for the omission! 9 X 13 is what I used.

        Reply
    3. J Unruh

      April 15, 2020 at 8:56 pm

      What size of pan did you use? sounds like a yummy cake!

      Reply
      • Kevin

        April 15, 2020 at 9:58 pm

        Gosh, I am sorry, that was an omission on my part 9 X 13 pan, enjoy!

        Reply
    4. Nana

      April 19, 2020 at 11:41 am

      Have you tried grating the hard stick of butter on a box grater? It makes shreds which very quickly soften when stirred into batter.

      Reply
      • Kevin

        April 19, 2020 at 12:23 pm

        Thank you, Nana, that is a REALLY good idea...ingenious, I will use that idea all the time when I have unsoftened butter in a recipe!

        Reply
    5. Debbie

      October 21, 2020 at 4:39 pm

      Did you grease the pan before adding the batter?

      Reply
      • Kevin

        October 21, 2020 at 5:07 pm

        Yes, lightly grease. Enjoy, that is a GOOD cake!

        Reply

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    Kevin Williams - The Amish Editor Amish Cook Column

    Hi There, I'm Kevin!

    Welcome to Amish365, where I share my knowledge of Amish cooking and culture! I’ve spent almost three decades exploring Amish settlements and kitchens from Maine to Montana and almost everywhere in between. I’ll occasionally throw in stories of my travels, journalism adventures (I’m a Pulitzer prize-nominated journalist), fascination with grocery stores and Kmarts, and much more!

    More about me →

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