Brown Sugar Spice Cake with Caramel Glaze

Baking a cake, especially a spice cake, is something that happens rarely in our home. I love to bake but generally it is cookies or brownies or other sweets that appear on my plate. It is not that I don’t like cake. I love cake but usually two people have a hard time finishing off an entire cake. Cookies can be frozen and well, it’s just easier to pick up a cookie and eat it on the run. Can’t do that with cake. And maybe that’s why cake is so special.

Cake is meant to be enjoyed while sitting at  table. Cake is meant to be served on a plate with a fork and a napkin. Cake is special. Cake means conversation and a break in the day. It is good with tea or coffee or milk. It is good for beginning friendships and for renewing them.  It is good to begin your day or to end it. Cake is pure pleasure.

There are many different kinds of cakes. Special cakes are for special occasions. They are pretty and covered with sinful frosting and sometimes delicate flowers. There are ultra rich cakes where “only a sliver” truly applies. There are bundt cakes that are fun for bridge club or for picnics or for the school bake sale. There are loaf cakes and pound cakes where only the freshest berries should be served along side. Without a doubt there are cupcakes, but today is not that kind of day.

 

Today is about old fashioned cakes. Cakes that are good just for the cake and not what’s on top. Cakes that are easy to make and always turn out. Old fashioned cakes like our grandmas used to make. (Well, I’m not sure about my grandmas.) But I did get this recipe from an old Wisconsin cookbook. It was a leap of faith cake. One that I wasn’t sure was written right. It called for putting the cake in an ungreased baking pan. I don’t think I’ve ever done that. But I did. And just like new friendships waiting to be discovered this cake rose with splendor and gave the signal to dive right in.

The smell of this cake was enough to drive the rabbit catcher up from the basement. It is enticing and filled  the air with the scent of spices like cinnamon and nutmeg and allspice. The caramel glaze is simple to make and tempting enough to burn your tongue on. I think it would be superlative on ice cream and though it just sinks into the cake, its flavor is not lost. The moisture and stickiness that it gives makes this cake sinful. And this is a cake that lasts. Its flavor gets better with age as the spices permeate the interior. I don’t think I’ve ever made a moister cake and that is another reason this cake will keep. If there is such a thing as keeping cakes…

Yesterday I made a new friend. The day before I made a new cake. Both are good things…