Almond Cake with Roasted Strawberries — Rhubarb on Top — The Recipe That Made It Real

August. The heat sits on Edison like a punishment. Rohan, now twenty months, has discovered that the garden hose is the greatest toy ever invented. He stands in the backyard in a diaper, holding the hose like a weapon, spraying everything — including Appa, who visited and was ambushed while reading in the lawn chair. "ROHAN!" Appa shouted, which is the most volume Venkatesh Krishnamurthy has produced in my lifetime. The newspaper was soaked. The crossword was ruined. Rohan laughed until he fell down. Amma, from the kitchen window: "He's like Arvind." Every behavior of Rohan's is attributed to Arvind. The loudness: Arvind. The chaos: Arvind. The stubborn refusal to follow instructions: Arvind. Rohan is apparently a reincarnation of his uncle, which Arvind finds both flattering and insulting. The book is in final proofs. Sarah Chen overnighted the galley — the typeset pages, bound in a plain cover, the book as it will appear except for the final printing. I held it in my hands — the weight of it, the physicality of seventy-five thousand words and one hundred and twenty recipes and a lifetime of Amma's sambar, pressed between two covers. I read it in one sitting. Not for editing — for feeling. I sat in the rocking chair and read my own book and cried at the sambar moment and laughed at the Christmas tree debate and ached at the miscarriage and felt the specific, vertiginous strangeness of reading your own life narrated back to you by your own voice. The book is real. The galley is proof. The words exist outside my laptop now. I gave Amma a copy of the galley. She held it, turned it over, read the back cover copy. She was quiet for a long time. "This is your book," she said. "This is OUR book, Amma." "The name says Priya Patel." "The recipes say Lakshmi Krishnamurthy." She opened to the first chapter. She read the first paragraph. She read about sambar. She read about herself. And she smiled. Not the half-smile, not the corner of the mouth. The full smile. The real one. "You got it right," she said. I got it right. The sambar. The book. The life. I got it right.

The night after I read the galley cover to cover — after I cried at the sambar paragraph, after Amma said you got it right — I needed to do something with my hands. Not editing, not emails to Sarah, not staring at the plain-covered bound pages on the kitchen counter. I needed to bake. This almond cake has been my “something happened” cake for years: the batter is forgiving, the roasted fruit fills the kitchen with a smell that feels like the end of something hard and the beginning of something good, and when it comes out of the oven it looks exactly as permanent and real as a book of recipes pressed between two covers. I made it that night, and Amma had a slice, and neither of us said much, and that was enough.

Almond Cake with Roasted Strawberries & Rhubarb on Top

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 45 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour 5 minutes | Servings: 8

Ingredients

• For the roasted fruit:
• 1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries, hulled and halved
• 1 cup rhubarb, sliced 1/2 inch thick
• 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• For the almond cake:
• 2 1/4 cups almond flour, packed
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 3 large eggs, room temperature
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• Powdered sugar for dusting (optional)

Instructions

1. Roast the fruit. Preheat oven to 375°F. Toss strawberries and rhubarb with 3 tablespoons sugar and lemon juice on a rimmed baking sheet. Spread in a single layer and roast for 20–22 minutes, until the fruit is soft and the juices are thick and slightly jammy. Set aside to cool slightly. Keep oven on.
2. Prepare the pan. Grease a 9-inch round cake pan with butter or coconut oil and line the bottom with parchment paper. Grease the parchment as well.
3. Mix the dry ingredients. In a medium bowl, whisk together almond flour, baking powder, and salt until no lumps remain.
4. Mix the wet ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk eggs and sugar vigorously for about 2 minutes until the mixture is pale and slightly thickened. Whisk in the melted butter, vanilla extract, and almond extract.
5. Combine. Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients with a spatula until just combined and smooth. Do not overmix.
6. Bake. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and spread evenly. Bake for 22–25 minutes, until the top is golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with just a few moist crumbs.
7. Cool and top. Let the cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and peel off the parchment. Allow to cool for at least 15 minutes before topping. Spoon the roasted strawberries and rhubarb — along with all their syrupy juices — over the top of the cake. Dust with powdered sugar if desired and serve immediately, or at room temperature.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 295 | Protein: 9g | Fat: 20g | Carbs: 22g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 115mg