Did Someone Say Cake?

I must admit, there is an embarrassing lack of cake on this self proclaimed Queen of Cakes blog! For shame! But I honestly don't often have an excuse to bake cakes at home, preferring instead to make smaller items that can easily be pawned off unwitting victims. Lord knows any substance left in this house with sugar in it will eventually end up in my mouth, and consequently in my magically shrinking jeans. One of those mysterious laws of nature or some such thing.
I feel sometimes as if my life is just a daily quest for more excuses and opportunities to slather frosting on something, and this lucky month my husband and his best friend both grew a year older. Perfect opportunities for a full cake! Every time I do make a cake at home however I get the longing for a nice turntable. I really don't have room in my kitchen for any more baking paraphernalia, but my heavens frosting cakes without turntables is a pain.

This cake recipe is from my new best friend, Heirloom Baking with the Brass Sisters. There are precious few books that have made such an impression on me as this lacy little bit of sweetness. These two sisters have spent years collecting boxes full of chicken scratch recipes on index cards and yellowing cooking pamphlets put out by the likes of the YWCA in Boston back in the 20's. The pages are full both of stories about the women who collected and baked these treats and photographs of an amazing collection of antique kitchen wares. I ignored a number of other obligations and activities and sat down to read every word in between the two blue plaid printed covers. I've decided I want to adopt these women as my aunts and sit at their kitchen table listening to stories of their lives for hours on end. To get a little taste, you can check out their site. Next on my wishlist is their cook book.

I paired the cake with some peanut butter whipped cream and a chocolate frosting. Both recipes were made up on the fly, but if anyone is interested I can mostly recall the ingredients ;)

Peanut Butter Chocolate Cake

1 3/4 c cake flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4c butter
1/4c peanut butter
1 c sugar
2 oz melted bittersweet chocolate
1 c milk
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350, line an 8" cake pan with parchment and grease (I use my empty butter wrappers) and flour the pan.
Sift dry ingredients.
Cream butter, peanut butter, and sugar until fluffy. And chocolate and mix well. Add dry ingredients alternately with milk and vanilla.
Bake for 45 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean.

And the ladies had this to say for this cake "This chocolate cake comes from Rachel Bank's copy of Laboratory Recipes. Rachel's handwritten recipe shows a strong French-Canadian influence, and we suspect that she may have traveled from her home in Maine to attended the cooking school run by the Boston YWCA. As for this cake, it reminds us of a giant chocolate-peanut butter truffle"