Delicate and Decadent Desserts: Sweet and Sour Cherry Cake

Cherries enjoy a very short growing season, and are only picked for about a month per crop. In the northern hemisphere, harvest ranges from June to August, which makes them such a delicacy to get fresh at the store. What you might not know is that the cherries that come fresh at the store are not the same kind that you can get canned or use in baking. We eat sweet cherries fresh and bake with the sour varieties. Each has its own merits. Sour cherries are higher in beta carotene and vitamin C. Sweet cherries are known for their ability to aid in the relief of muscle pain.

When baking with cherries, a common problem encountered is that they are so dense that they simply sink to the bottom of your cake batter. The modern solution to this dilemma is to introduce heavy cream and add moist, custard-like undertones to the cake. Personally, I find something wholesome in the older method of just thickening the cake batter. The result is something similar to a pound cake in texture, but the juice inherent in the fresh cherries creates a pleasant, zesty flavor throughout counterpointed by the occasional burst of tartness when you bite into one of the canned cherries.

This recipe started out as using fresh sweet cherries only, Rainier for preference, but always seemed to be a little too one-sided for comfort. By adding sour cherries, a solid teacake is improved upon while retaining its humble, four-square heritage.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 8-ounce can baking cherries
• 1 ½ cup fresh cherries (Rainier or Bing preferably)
• ½ cup dried candied cherries
• powdered sugar
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• 1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
• 6 tablespoons butter
• ¾ cup & 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 5 large eggs

METHOD

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Take round cake pan 9-inches in diameter, grease the interior, then dust it with flour to create a textured, browned base and sides later.
3. Remove the stems of the fresh cherries, split them in half over a bowl to catch excess juice and pry out the pits. Drain the can of baking cherries, wash them and then pat them dry on a paper towel. Toss the dried candied cherries (and only the dried candied cherries) in flour until thoroughly coated. This will prevent them from burning when baked. The juice inherent in both fresh and canned cherries will protect them.
4. Separate the egg yolks from the whites. Combine the egg yolks and half the granulated sugar with an electric mixer on high speed for 5 minutes or until creamy.
5. Allow the butter to melt, then beat it into the egg mixture and drizzle in what juice you collected when halving the fresh cherries.
6. In a separate bowl, combine the flour with the baking powder and mix thoroughly. Fold this into the egg yolks.
7. In yet another bowl, combine the egg whites with the remainder of the sugar and beat it until stiff. Should a particularly thick cake be desired, consider adding ¼ cup of heavy whipping cream, though this is by no means strictly necessary.
8. Fold the egg whites into the yolk mixture and pour the completed batter into your pan.
9. Sprinkle all three types of cherries across the top, and push them into the batter at varying depths with the back of a wooden spoon or toothpick. The batter will swallow them up and smooth over after a few minutes of sitting.
10. Bake for one hour, until a toothpick inserted into the center retracts cleanly. Overturn cake onto cooling rack or dish.
11. You can leave the cake as is, or choose to decorate it in one of two ways. The first is with a simple dusting of confectioner’s sugar. The second is to whisk _2/3 cup of powdered sugar into ¼ cup of milk, add ½ teaspoon of vanilla extract, and paint the resulting glaze over the cake’s top before it hardens.