Hedvig’s brown butter, miso and walnut cake

This is for all the salty-sweet lovers. Just be mindful of the potency of your miso: some are saltier than others, so try the recipe with less if you feel yours may be extra-flavourful and salty. I often use a reduced-salt version for this cake.

Credit: Bloomsbury / Joe Woodhouse

• serves

  9

• prep

  20 minutes

• cook

  45 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

At the beginning of 2020, I gave myself permission to have as much cake as I wanted to eat, and I have never regretted that decision. I will admit that my cake hedonism was easily sustained because of Hedvig Winsvold, who made the best cakes in her cosy Scandi-furnished café called Tromsø (just in case you are curious it’s pronounced ‘Troom-suh’).

Ingredients

For the cake

• 250 g unsalted butter
• 30 g reduced-salt miso paste
• 225 g caster sugar
• 3 eggs
• 225 g self-raising flour
• 50 ml full-fat yogurt
• 40 g broken walnuts

For the syrup

• 50 g white sugar
• 50 ml water
• 20 g reduced-salt miso paste
• 40 g walnuts, chopped

Cooling time: 2-3 hours.

Instructions

1. A couple of hours before you bake, put the butter in a small pan and heat until it bubbles gently. Use a whisk to scrape the base and sides of the pan, so the milk solids don’t burn. From the moment all the butter melts, it should take 3–4 minutes over medium heat. Have a bowl ready, to tip the brown butter into when it is ready. It will start smelling like butterscotch, its colour changing from light gold to amber, and its bubbling sound will quieten. Pour it into the bowl.
2. Whisk the miso into the warm butter; you should have 225g of butter mix. Put it into a container and leave it to cool and firm up (stir it a couple of times while it sets, to re-emulsify). You want it to be soft, like room-temperature butter.
3. Preheat the oven to 170°C (150°C  fan-forced). Line a 20cm square or round cake tin, or a 900g loaf tin, with baking parchment.
4. Put the cooled brown butter-miso mix in a mixing bowl, or the bowl of a food mixer, together with the sugar. Beat for 5 minutes with electric beaters or the food mixer at a high speed. (If you’re doing it by hand, beat it for a little longer.)
5. Beat the eggs one at a time into the mixture, scraping down the bowl in between each. Add the self-raising flour and fold it in carefully by hand with a spatula.
6. I know this bit will feel weird – to add yoghurt at the end, after the flour – but don’t worry. It works. So mix in the yoghurt, again by hand. Spread the batter into the prepared tin, scatter the walnuts over, and then push them into the batter slightly.
7. Bake for 40–50 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool.
8. While it is cooling, in a pan dissolve the sugar in the measured water. Take it off the heat, add the miso and whisk it all together. Add the chopped walnuts and put the pan back over medium heat for a couple of minutes, stirring the whole time. Spread the syrup over the cake, let it cool slightly, and then enjoy!

 

Recipe and image from Home Food by Olia Hercules, photography by Joe Woodhouse (Bloomsbury, HB$46.80).

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.

At the beginning of 2020, I gave myself permission to have as much cake as I wanted to eat, and I have never regretted that decision. I will admit that my cake hedonism was easily sustained because of Hedvig Winsvold, who made the best cakes in her cosy Scandi-furnished café called Tromsø (just in case you are curious it’s pronounced ‘Troom-suh’).