The Feel Good Cake

 The Feel Good Cake

 This cake is so delicious, so rich and so comforting, that my mother called it, “The Feel Good Cake.” Whether she made it plain or filled with chocolate-nut streusel, it was impossible to resist. She kept it in one of those cake servers with a glass dish on the bottom and a metal-domed cover that ceremoniously clanged when it was lifted.  It always brought joy to lift it and see one of these beautiful cakes. She baked it when someone was sick, recovering from childbirth, to celebrate an event, or just because she had the ingredients.

We're not sure where the recipe came from but my mother could bake it with her eyes closed. She wrote the recipe in her notebook but never looked at it.

 One year, she baked it in loaf form for all of our teachers for Christmas.  The school's secretary saw the cake and accused my mom of stealing her recipe. My mother was indignant. "I don't use a recipe," she said.

One of the grammar school nuns, upon tasting it, wrote a note, "Thank you for the wonderful fruitcake." My mother was equally insulted by someone calling her best cake a fruitcake.

 Try this recipe and you'll see why...

Ingredients: 

1 stick of butter
1 cup of sour cream
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda

Filling: 

1 cup chopped walnuts
2 Tbs sugar
2 tsp cocoa powder
1/4 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp cinnamon  

Mix butter, sour cream, eggs, vanilla and sugar until smooth and creamy. Add flour, baking powder, and baking soda and beat until smooth.  In a separate bowl, mix the filling ingredients. Grease and flour either a bundt pan or loaf pan. Put half the mixture in the pan. Sprinkle the filling, covering the whole surface, reserving 1 tablespoon of the filling.  Put the rest of the cake batter in the pan. Sprinkle the reserved cocoa mixture on the top. Bake in 350 F oven for 45 minutes. Check with a knife to see if it's done. 

I hope this makes you feel good!!!

PS: I had some extra batter and made muffins too. Notice the cake server. Clang!