How I found baking Claire Saffitz’s Rhubarb cake
I love Claire Saffitz. I will happily admit it. I will shout it from the internet rooftops. I love her almost as much as Mike from Mike’s Mic (IWDFCFTBATK if you know, you know. If you don’t I’ve linked the video in that fun string of letters that will soon make sense). I’ve loved Claire since discovering her a few years ago in her previous online life as Claire from the Bon Appétit test kitchen. She hosted a famous series on their YouTube channel called Gourmet Makes where she would recreate popular snacks in the test kitchen. It was a delight. Then Bon Appétit were outed as not being such a delight, and Claire decided to go her own way. I’m so very glad she did.
Claire’s new channel Dessert Person is full of the same great content and hilarious editing as her BA days, but it’s filmed in her home kitchen in New York which adds to the personal touch. She posts new videos every Thursday and it doesn’t matter what she’s baking, I’m a sucker and will always watch. She’s been baking her way through her newest book “Dessert Person” and one of her cakes spoke to me enough that I had to give it a try - her Rhubarb cake.
Baked in a loaf tin this cake not only has rhubarb across the top, but a rhubarb compote mixed through it as well as pieces of rhubarb scattered throughout. I picked the rhubarb from my dad’s garden, kept the pinkest pieces for the top and dutifully cut up the greener ones. With orange and vanilla being the flavours that Claire has paired with the zingy rhubarb the taste of the finished cake takes on an almost sherbet quality, especially with the top retaining a sugary crunch from a sprinkling of demerara sugar before you bake it. Claire mention’s in the video that this is a cake for pretty much any time of day and she’s not wrong. As soon as I’d tried a piece it was pretty much all I thought about eating at any time of the day until I’d finished the entire loaf (across a number of days and I did give my friend a piece, I’m not a complete cake monster).
The mixture itself was really fairly easy to make although you do end up with quite a lot of washing up which is a bit of a down side. The cake takes a good hour to bake though as it’s so moist due to containing yogurt, so you’ve got plenty of time to get the dishes done or load a dishwasher whilst you wait. My only watch out would be to place the loaf pan onto another sheet tray before baking. My mixture rose enough that I had some spillage over one side as I went to turn the tin around in the oven, which meant my final loaf looked like it was missing a side. It was still beautiful and tasted great even with its imperfections!
Claire’s videos are so easy to follow that this recipe was a joy to follow. The info box of her YouTube videos have all of the ingredients listed out with corresponding measurements in both cups and grams (for those of us that can’t cope with cups!) and timestamped so that you can find your way back to exactly where you want to be in the recipe if you lose your place or need something repeating. It’s such a shame that rhubarb is so seasonal as this recipe is one I would make again and again if it wasn’t.
I do love other recipes of Claire’s though, and she has a few other loaf style cakes in her book Dessert Person which I’ve linked to here if you want to pick yourself up a copy. I’ve baked enough from the YouTube channel that I really need to buy one for myself now! I hope this might spur you on to have a go at baking one of her recipes for yourself, or just check out her YouTube channel for some joyful content.
Big love, Sarah x
