I’ve baked many a cake in the 24 long years I’ve been on this planet. Cakes covered in cinnamon streusel, pudding-filled, frosting-covered cakes, cakes that look hideous but taste beautiful (never the reverse). This cake, though, is my favorite cake to bake and eat. The recipe (here without a paywall) is perfect when followed as written, though I still tweak it sometimes by browning and re-solidifying the butter for a deeper, funkier flavor or using peaches, blueberries, and most recently, pluots from the aforementioned L.A. farmers market in place of the traditional plums. Any way you bake it, you’ll get to experience the pure bliss of slicing through its warm, crispy exterior, into a pillow-like cake full of fruit even sweeter and juicier than before you scattered it over the buttery batter.
