A lot of the time in my house, things that are far more pressing than work, relaxation, and even, perish the thought, knitting, transpire. Yesterday afternoon I had one of those experiences.
I found Ollie, who is four and about to start Kindergarten, in the kitchen, mixing up a large bag of cherries in a big bowl of water, and getting ready to add some flour and sugar.
It was clear we were going to be cooking.
I tried to buy him off with brownies, but he wouldn’t agree. After intense negotiation, he assented to substitute peaches for cherries, but he was pretty set on his original plan. I added a couple of extra ingredients, and we made a cake, along with Ellie who wandered into the kitchen and graciously helped out with licking the bowl after the cake was in the pan.
Although I was a little bit worried that this haphazard method of putting ingredients together would make a pretty nasty slush, we ended up with a delicious cake, sort of a fruity pound cake, that would also be delicious as cupcakes. I thought I would share the recipe with y’all, since I can’t show you a picture of the finished cake — it disappeared too quickly.
Ollie’s Peach Cake
Preheat oven to 350`/ Set two sticks of butter out on counter
Dice up two fresh, organic peaches. Allow small child with you to eat a couple of bites.
In a medium bowl, mix 1 cup flour with 1 teaspoon baking powder and a dash of salt (amuse small child by letting him level the measurements)
Cream butter in mixer. Add 1 cup sugar. Mix well, scrapping down sides of bowl as necessary.
Add in four eggs, one at a time, mixing after each addition.
Add 1 teaspoon of vanilla (or cardamon) extract.
Mash peach dice in a small bowl – pressing against the side of the bowl to extract a little juice. Put half of peaches in butter/sugar mixture and mix. Then, add half of flour mixture to butter/sugar and mix. Repeat again, using up all of the peaches and flour mixtures. Mix well to incorporate.
Grease or use cooking spray in a loaf pan. Pour batter in pan. Bake for 70 minutes at 350` (or until done).
Let cake rest 10 minutes, while mixing up a glaze from 3T sugar and 3T peach (or other) juice. Remove cake from pan. Poke gentle holes in cake with a spike and pour glaze over cake. Cool. Devour.
this is precious – and I can’t believe Ollie is going to kindergarten.
shirley
haha, too funny he preferred cake over brownies. you would have bought me off for sure!! love that pic … and recipe.
What a sweet story! I’m so glad you dropped what you were doing and helped him make his cake … and eat it too!
Karen
Yum, this sounds delicious. Ollie will have to make this for me on my next visit. He’s growing up. How is Mom handling him going off to kindergarten?
You are a brave and wonderful mom! I think I would have run for cover!!