Marble Cake

Perfect tea time accompaniment...

Its amazing how something so simple, can look so sophisticating. When i was a child it always used to fascinate me that how can two flavors be baked in a single cake with such beautiful designs ( I also used to try fist eating all the white cake parts and then the chocolate parts from the slice).

I always used to love a slice of marble cake either with tea in the evening or in the lunch box, or a late night snack. We used to get this lovely slabs of freshly baked marble cake at the bakery which would get over in no time at all.

Its one of those things that makes you realize that beautiful things don't always need a lot of effort, its more about the technique and the thought behind it.

A marble cake is a basic white cake, with cocoa powder mixed with some of the batter and then swirled in. the technique is the same as chocolate swirl cake

i also tried this coffee swirl cake with the same technique.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup ground oats
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 tsp vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 cup plain, yogurt
25 g cocoa powder
2 tbsp milk

OR

2 tbsp butter, room temperature
2 1/2 tsp instant coffee granules
1/2 tsp cocoa powder
1/4 cup brown sugar


Method:
Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease and flour a 10-inch bundt pan.
In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light. Beat in eggs, one at a time, followed by vanilla extract.
Stir in half of the flour mixture, followed by the yogurt (or sour cream), then stir in remaining flour mixture. Batter will be thick.
In a seperate bowl dissolve the cocoa powder in the milk, and then mix it with half or 1/3 of the cake batter.

OR


In a small bowl, beat together butter, instant coffee/espresso, cocoa powder and brown sugar until well combined. Mixture will be crumbly. add 3 - 4 tbsp of the batter to this mixture

Spread half of the cake batter into prepared pan. Spread the chocolate or coffee batter in the center of the layer of cake batter (doesn't need to be neat), then top with remaining cake batter, spreading it evenly to cover the chocolate or coffee mixture. swirl with a knife or a wooden skewer.

Bake for 45-50 minutes, until the cake springs back when lightly pressed and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
Allow cake to cool in the pan for 20 minutes, then turn it out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Plain Marble cake

Coffee swirl cake

If you have more time on hand or if you are feeling more adventurous, you can even try piping a design with the brown colour batter on the base. although my first try din't turn out rite, i guess it was because of the brown sugar in my coffee batter...maybe next time

Failed attempt at making hearts