Kentucky Butter Cake
After 5 years in the Midwest, I’m very excited to become a West Coaster again! All of my coastal friends and family think of Cincinnati as flyover country (as did I, before I moved here) but I have truly enjoyed experiencing this city as it gentrified OTR, grew an MLS team, and cheered on Fiona. As an ode to my time in the tri-state, my last post as an Ohioan is this Kentucky Butter Cake that is pure joy and worth the splurge. When I flew to Cincinnati for my medical school interview, I was VERY confused about why Kayak was routing me to Hebron, KY and had to check google maps. For my friends who never came to visit, Cincinnati is right on the river bordering Kentucky and I’ve spent the last 5 years grocery shopping in Kentucky because it’s somehow closer than the grocery stores across the city on the Ohio side.
Making this cake, I feel like I understand better the obesity epidemic of the Midwest. Why be healthy when I can instead enjoy this cake? Kentucky butter cake is a moist pound cake base with a butter sauce poured over the bottom before the cake has cooled to seep through the crevices. If you make it (which you absolutely should) be sure you have a plan in place to share because it would be SO easy to justify one more slice… and then another. This cake saves well in an airtight container for a few days, so don’t feel the need to rush through it. It would be delicious served with fresh berries but ice cream would put even my sweet tooth over the edge. Several versions of this cake add bourbon, which would be delicious but I left it out as I was making it specifically to take to my ICU team during a long call shift. One thing I didn’t get to tick off my bucket list is touring the Kentucky Bourbon Trail. Can’t believe I missed that one, but then the only way that I enjoy bourbon is in baked goods.
I was curious about the origin of the Kentucky Butter Cake and dove into more information than I’d signed up for about various butter cakes. I learned that Butter Cake evolved from the British pound cake after the invention of baking powder and other leavening agents during the 19th century. Kentucky Butter Cake is also not to be confused with Gooey Butter Cake (aka Chess Cake), which was the happy accident of a German baker in St Louis, MI in the late 1930s or early 1940s. Then it seems the first Kentucky Butter Cake was Nell Lewis’s prize winning entry in the 1963 Pillsbury Bake-Off Contest in Platte City, Missouri. I assume the Kentucky part of the name is for the Bourbon in the sauce.
And with that, Goodbye Cincinnati! It’s truly been a pleasure. I may be back to visit. Maybe.
Prepping a bundt pan is an important step to preserve the design and pretty edges. Generally, I’d recommend melting butter and using a pastry brush to coat the inside of the pan being careful not to let the butter pool in the bottom. Throw in a few tablespoons of flour and shake the pan until flour is coating all surfaces of the pan, then dump the extra. That being said, my favorite bundt has many nooks and crannies and I’ve been using Baker’s Joy baking spray with flour with good success.
- 1 cup unsalted butter, cubed at room temperature
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 4 large eggs
- 1 tablespoon vanilla
- 3 cups all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
- *If desired, substitute vanilla for 1/4 cup bourbon whiskey
- 1/3 cup unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons water
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- *If desired, substitute vanilla and water for 1/4 cup of bourbon whiskey
- Preheat oven to 325F. Grease a 10" liberally with butter and dust with flour. Alternatively spray liberally with baking spray.
- In a large bowl, cream the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy, scraping the sides down as needed. Add the eggs and vanilla (unless substituting bourbon) and incorporate. If using bourbon, whisk together bourbon and buttermilk in a small bowl.
- Whisk together remaining dry ingredients until well mixed. Add dry ingredients to the wet mixture in small batches alternating with the buttermilk-bourbon mixture, and stir until just combined after each addition.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake 65-75 minutes until a toothpick stuck into the center comes out clean.
- When the cake is done, make the glaze. Combine all ingredients into a small saucepan over medium-low heat. Stir continuously until the butter is melted and sugar dissolved. Do not boil.
- Poke holes all over the warm cake (still in pan) using a knife and pour glaze evenly over the cake.
- Allow the cake to cool completely in the pan, then invert onto a serving plate.
- This cake is great the day it is made, but is excellent a day later after resting for a night.