Vanilla Cake With Vanilla Bean Browned Butter Glaze -- The Cake I Bake When I Can't Be There

Summer solstice has passed and the days are at their longest, which means the light is generous and the evenings stretch and Marvin and I sit on the back porch after dinner and watch the light fade slowly, which is the only entertainment available to us and which is, I am discovering, sufficient. We used to fill our evenings with television, with reading, with conversation, with the shared domestic life of two people who had been together long enough to be comfortable in each other's silence. Now the silence is different — it's not comfortable, it's the silence of a man who has run out of words and a woman who has too many — but the porch is the same porch and the light is the same light and the sitting together is the sitting together, and I have decided that presence does not require conversation. Presence requires only presence.

Noah turned one this month — actually April, but the birthday celebration was delayed by the pandemic, and David and Jennifer finally arranged a small outdoor gathering in their backyard in White Plains. I was invited. I went. I wore a mask. I sat in a lawn chair ten feet from my grandson and watched him eat his first birthday cake — smash cake, they call it, a small cake designed to be destroyed by a one-year-old's hands — and he destroyed it with the thoroughness of a person who has been waiting his entire life for this moment, which, technically, he has. I did not hold him. I watched from my lawn chair and clapped and sang and ached. The aching is chronic now. It's the background hum of this year: wanting to touch the people you love and being told, by science and by decency, that you cannot.

I made a lemon pound cake for Noah's birthday — a dense, buttery, lemony cake that is my go-to celebration cake, not as dramatic as a layer cake but more reliable, more Ruth. I left it on the porch table and Jennifer sliced it and served it and Noah ate none of it because he was full of smash cake, but Ethan ate two slices, which is the family tradition: whatever Noah doesn't eat, Ethan eats. This is the natural order. I support it.

The lemon pound cake I brought to Noah’s birthday was a last-minute stand-in for what I actually wanted to make — this vanilla cake, with its browned butter glaze that smells like warmth and patience and things going slowly right. I talked myself out of it because a layer cake felt presumptuous for a lawn chair occasion, for a gathering where I was a guest at a distance rather than a grandmother in the kitchen. But the truth is I have been making this cake for every birthday in this family for fifteen years, and when I got home that evening and sat on the porch with Marvin and watched the light go, I thought: next year, Noah. Next year I’ll be close enough to hand you a slice myself.

Vanilla Cake With Vanilla Bean Browned Butter Glaze

Prep Time: 25 min | Cook Time: 35 min | Total Time: 1 hr 15 min (plus cooling) | Servings: 12

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp fine salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
• 1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
• 4 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup whole milk, room temperature
• For the Vanilla Bean Browned Butter Glaze:
• 8 tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter
• 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise and seeds scraped (or 1 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste)
• 2 1/2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
• 4–5 tbsp whole milk or heavy cream
• Pinch of fine salt

Instructions

1. Prepare the pans. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease two 9-inch round cake pans, line the bottoms with parchment, and grease the parchment. Dust lightly with flour and tap out the excess.
2. Mix the dry ingredients. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl and set aside.
3. Cream butter and sugar. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the softened butter on medium speed for 2 minutes until pale and fluffy. Add the granulated sugar and continue beating for 3–4 minutes, scraping down the bowl as needed, until the mixture is very light.
4. Add eggs and vanilla. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the vanilla extract and mix until just combined. The batter may look slightly curdled — that’s fine.
5. Alternate dry and wet. 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.
6. Bake. Divide the batter evenly between the prepared pans and smooth the tops. Bake for 30–35 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with just a few moist crumbs. Cool in pans for 15 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely before glazing.
7. Brown the butter for the glaze. Melt the butter in a light-colored saucepan over medium heat, swirling occasionally. Continue cooking until the butter turns golden amber and smells nutty, about 5–7 minutes. Remove from heat immediately and stir in the vanilla bean seeds (and pod). Let cool for 10 minutes, then remove the pod.
8. Make the glaze. Whisk the sifted powdered sugar and salt into the cooled browned butter. Add milk or cream one tablespoon at a time, whisking until the glaze is thick but pourable. It should coat a spoon and fall in a slow ribbon.
9. Glaze the cake. Set one cake layer on a serving plate. Pour a third of the glaze over the top, letting it drip down the sides. Place the second layer on top and pour the remaining glaze over, coaxing it gently to the edges. Allow to set for at least 20 minutes before slicing.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 520 | Protein: 5g | Fat: 24g | Carbs: 72g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 210mg