Best Quick Cake for All Seasons and Occasions!

This is not your mom’s cup cake, it’s “My Mutti’s Becherkuchen”! And as soon as you try it, I believe you’ll also call it the “Best Quick Cake For All Seasons and Occasions”…

Let’s get the name-thing out of the way: “Mutti” is “mom” in German, and “Becherkuchen” translates to “cup cake”. My mom shared the original German recipe with me many years ago. The nutty, buttery sheet cake has been a favorite at social gatherings ever since. But when people have wanted to ask me to make it, the name has always been confusing. So I came up with a new one…

“Best Quick Cake For All Seasons and Occasions” works for me. Too long? Well, the time to make the cake is very short. It takes only about 45 minutes to make: from gathering ingredients (incl. chopping nuts) all the way to having a clean kitchen again and eating a hot piece of cake fresh from the oven. Mmmm.

A fluffy cake made with whipped cream (in the batter!) and topped with almonds roasting in butter and caramelizing sugar while the cake is baking? Of course, it’s delicious! Nobody will believe you that it’s this easy to make.

Because it’s a sheet cake without icing, it’s no-mess finger food and easy to transport. So the Best Quick Cake is ideal for picnics, parties and the great outdoors. The timeless ingredients make the cake a perfect match for fall drinks, during the winter holiday seasons, for a spring picnic or at a summer BBQ. You’ll make everyone happier (well, except for the vegans and people avoiding nuts and sugar).

In Germany, we measure ingredients differently – and even baking sheets are a significantly different size. So I converted and tested this recipe to make it work for an American kitchen. At the bottom of this post, I’ve included the measurements for a German kitchen. It makes more cake; but you’ll need a German-sized or commercial-sized baking pan!

Ingredients (American kitchen):

For the cake batter:

3/4 cup sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla sugar

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

3 eggs

3/4 cup heavy cream

For the topping:

1 stick (8 tablespoons) butter

3/4 cup sugar

3 tablespoons milk

1 1/2 cups almonds (and/or hazelnuts)

Steps:

1. Preheat oven to 400 F.
2. Mix dry ingredients: sugar, vanilla sugar, baking powder, flour.
3. Whip heavy cream.
4. Stir eggs into mixed dry ingredients until you have a moist cake batter.
5. Gently mix whipped cream into batter.
6. Spread batter onto a baking-paper-lined or greased baking sheet (around 11 x 15 in).
7. Bake for about 10-15 minutes until light brown.
8. While cake is in oven: chop the almonds, hazelnuts or almond-hazelnut mixture…
9. Melt the butter over medium heat on the stove.
10. Add 2nd batch of sugar and milk into the liquified butter.
11. Pull half-baked cake out of the oven.
12. Mix chopped nuts into the sugar-butter liquid.
13. Using a spoon, spread sugar-butter-nuts mixture over the cake.
14. Return cake to oven for another 10 minutes.
15. Pull cake out, try to have enough patience to let it cool, enjoy!

Happier Tips:

Traditionally, sliced almonds are used for the Becherkuchen. But by using hand-chopped almonds or nuts, you’ll get a mix of nut-flour that binds nicely with the butter-sugar liquid AND also bigger nut-chunks that give the cake a lovely crunch.

If you can’t find vanilla sugar (e.g. Dr. Oetker’s Vanilla Sugar) at your local store, you can make it yourself (in a food processor combine 1 cup of sugar with vanilla seeds scraped out of 1 vanilla bean) or use a substitute (1 1/2 tsp vanilla sugar = 1 tsp vanilla extract + 1 tsp sugar).

I hope you enjoy making, sharing and eating the Best Quick Cake for all seasons and occasions. Please, let us know in the comments below if you’ve tried the cake, if you know it by any other name and if you have your own favorite quick cake recipe. 

xx Luci

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Ingredients (German kitchen):

For the cake batter:

1 “Becher”/cup (200, 236 or 250ml) heavy cream

Traditionally, you use the “Becher” (= container or cup) the heavy cream was sold in to measure all the other ingredients, not an American “measuring cup”. Thus the name of the cake: Becherkuchen. 200ml or 250ml are common sizes for heavy cream containers in Germany. 236ml-sized heavy cream containers are available in the USA and match 1 American measuring-cup. Any of the 3 Becher-sizes listed make for a delicious cake – just be consistent in using the Becher-size or cup-size of your choice. The gram measurements listed are based on using 236 ml / 1 US-cup of heavy cream. The German baking sheet is around 14 x 17 inches.

1 “Becher”/cup sugar (200g)

1 packet vanilla sugar (9g or 1 1/2 tsp)

1 packet baking powder (14g or 5 tsp)

2 “Becher”/cups all-purpose flour (285g)

4 eggs

For the topping:

125g butter (10 tablespoons)

1 “Becher”/cup sugar (200g)

4 tablespoons milk

200g almonds (and/or hazelnuts)