Mamaw Emily’s Strawberry Cake

Miya turns three this week and the birthday party is a celebration of who she has become: a small, fierce, onigiri-eating, miso-soup-drinking, step-stool-standing person who knows the word for daikon in two languages and who told the cat this morning that his behavior was "not acceptable," which is a Fumiko word and which proves that the inheritance travels not just through recipes but through vocabulary, through the specific words that a family uses, generation after generation, to describe the standard.

The party was at the park — ten kids, a few parents, the now-traditional onigiri alongside a cat-shaped birthday cake because Miya's love of the cat has not diminished, it has merely matured from "chase the cat" to "discuss the cat's shortcomings in Fumiko's language." Fumiko's little ceramic bowl sat at the head of the picnic table, filled with rice, because Miya requested it, because the bowl is the talisman, the physical object that connects this party in Portland to a kitchen in Sacramento to a woman who is gone but whose bowl is here and whose rice is here and whose great-granddaughter is here, turning three, eating cake with both hands.

I made chirashi sushi for the adult guests — festive, colorful, the celebration food — and onigiri in three flavors for the kids. The onigiri vanished. The chirashi was admired. Lin said, "You should cater," which I dismissed because catering is a job and the blog is already becoming a job and yoga is still a job and motherhood is the most demanding job and I do not need more jobs. I need more hours. I need a day with thirty-six hours. I need to sleep and also to never sleep because the sleeping hours are the hours when the writing calls and the dashi cools and the recipe cards wait in their frames for someone to read them by lamplight.

Miya stood on her step stool after the party and helped me wash the dishes. Her "helping" is primarily splashing and saying "clean clean clean" but the proximity is the point. She is in the kitchen. She is learning. She is absorbing. The step stool — the one I bought when she was fifteen months old — is the most important purchase I have made as a parent. It is the threshold between watching and participating, between eating and cooking, between being fed and feeding. She is crossing the threshold. She is three. She is exactly where she should be.

We had the cat-shaped cake from the bakery for Miya, because three-year-olds deserve exactly the cake they asked for — but for the adults, I wanted something homemade, something that felt like it belonged to a kitchen and a person rather than a display case. Mamaw Emily’s Strawberry Cake is that kind of recipe: it carries a name, which means it carries a history, and on a day when Fumiko’s bowl sat at the head of the picnic table, I wanted the dessert to hold the same kind of weight. Named recipes feel like the right thing to serve at a party that is really, underneath the streamers and the onigiri, a celebration of inheritance.

Prep Time: 25 min | Cook Time: 30 min | Total Time: 55 min | Servings: 12

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups granulated sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup whole milk, room temperature
1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries, hulled and finely diced (divided)
2 tablespoons strawberry jam
For the Strawberry Frosting:
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
1/2 cup fresh strawberries, hulled and pureed (strained)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Pinch of salt

Instructions

Prepare pans. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease two 9-inch round cake pans, line bottoms with parchment paper, and lightly flour the sides. Set aside.
Mix dry ingredients. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
Cream butter and sugar. In a large bowl, beat softened butter and granulated sugar together with an electric mixer on medium-high speed for 3–4 minutes until pale and very fluffy. Scrape down the sides as needed.
Add eggs and vanilla. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Mix in vanilla extract. The batter should look smooth and cohesive.
Alternate wet and dry. With the mixer on low, add the flour mixture in three additions, alternating with the milk in two additions (flour — milk — flour — milk — flour). Mix only until just combined after each addition; do not overmix.
Fold in strawberries. Gently fold 1 cup of the diced strawberries and the strawberry jam into the batter using a rubber spatula. Reserve the remaining 1/2 cup diced strawberries for garnish.
Bake. Divide batter evenly between the prepared pans. Bake for 28–32 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and the edges pull slightly away from the pan. Do not overbake.
Cool completely. Let cakes cool in pans on a wire rack for 15 minutes, then turn out and cool completely on the rack before frosting. Rushing this step will melt the frosting.
Make the frosting. Beat softened butter on medium-high until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add sifted powdered sugar one cup at a time, beating on low after each addition. Add the strained strawberry puree, vanilla, and a pinch of salt. Increase speed to medium-high and beat for 2 minutes until smooth, creamy, and spreadable. If frosting is too soft, refrigerate for 10 minutes before using.
Assemble. Place one cake layer on a serving plate or cake stand. Spread an even layer of frosting over the top. Place the second layer on top. Frost the top and sides of the cake with the remaining frosting. Scatter the reserved fresh diced strawberries over the top as garnish. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before slicing.

Nutrition (per serving)

Mamaw Emily’s Strawberry Cake — The Birthday Table Deserves Something That Carries a Name