Strawberry Olive Oil Cake

The simplest of snack cakes—a soft sour cream and olive oil cake studded with sweet, fresh strawberries.

In case you’ve missed it, I have spent the last month harping on and on about the beautiful, perfect strawberries that I picked at a local farm. I filled a flat with warm summer berries, ate a significant number on the drive home, and then I got to work. I made strawberry preserves, fresh strawberry ice cream, and this cake.

This was a whim recipe. I had planned on the preserves and ice cream, but quickly realized that I still had a bounty of berries, so I thumbed through Yossy Arefi’s Snacking Cakes to see if I could riff on one of her recipes. This cake is as simple as it gets—extra moist from the olive oil and sour cream, studded with a layer of sweet berries. We spent a few days cutting off a little sliver every time we walked through the kitchen. It’s the perfect, low-effort summer cake.

how to make a strawberry olive oil snack cake

Guys, this is truly the easiest cake around. You only need a handful of ingredients (most of which you probably have on hand), it only takes one bowl, and the adaptations are endless.

You’ll need:

Sugar: Granulated sugar for sweetness, plus a little more to create a crunchy layer on top of the cake. You can play with demerara or turbinado sugar for the topping for an extra crunch.

Eggs: Two large eggs help provide both moisture and structure for this recipe.

Sour Cream: I love baking with sour cream because it adds tenderness, flavor, and density to my cakes. You can sub in greek yogurt, ricotta, or even créme fraîche if you’re feeling fancy.

Olive Oil: You want a good grassy olive oil for this cake. The olive oil flavor pairs so well with the strawberries, and since it’s an oil-based cake, you know it will be extra moist.

Vanilla: I used the seeds scraped from a vanilla bean for this recipe, but you could use vanilla bean powder, paste, extract.

Flour: Just simple all purpose flour, though if you’re feeling experimental, subbing in 25% spelt flour would be nutty and lovely.

Baking Powder and Baking Soda: Baking powder is used for leavening here, while the baking soda helps to counteract the acidity of the sour cream. If you’re interested in learning more about the difference between the two—read this.

Strawberries: The real star of the show. I used warm, freshly picked berries for this recipe because the flavor will really shine. Slice them thinly to prevent sogginess, or sub in black, blue, or raspberries.

Yield one 9" cake

Author Anna Ramiz

Prep time

20 Min

Cook time

50 Min

Total time

1 H & 10 M

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Strawberry Olive Oil Cake

The simplest of snack cakes—a soft sour cream and olive oil cake studded with sweet, fresh strawberries. Adapted from Yossy Arefi's book Snacking Cakes.

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup (150 g) granulated sugar, plus 2 tsp for sprinkling
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup (220 g) sour cream
• 1/2 cup (120 ml) olive oil
• 1 vanilla bean, scraped
• 3/4 tsp kosher salt
• 1 1/4 cup (160 g) all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 160 g strawberries, thinly sliced

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350° F and line a 9" cake pan with parchment paper. Set aside.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar and eggs until frothy.
3. Add the sour cream, olive oil, and vanilla bean seeds and whisk again until smooth and homogenized.
4. Add the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda and whisk again until just incorporated and no flour streaks remain.
5. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and top with the sliced strawberries. Sprinkle with the remaining 2 tsp of sugar and bake for 40-50 minutes, until the top of the cake is deeply golden brown and the center is set.
6. Let the cake cool completely in the pan. Dust with powdered sugar just before serving.

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Double Strawberry Galettes

Farmer’s market strawberries are tucked into homemade pie crust to make these miniature double strawberry galettes. Serve with macerated strawberries and vanilla ice cream for an easy, summer dessert.

Galettes are my very favorite summer dessert and I don’t care who knows it!

As I was brainstorming for this recipe, I had a bit of a culinary revelation. Galettes are best in the summer and pies are best in the fall—here is why. In the summer, fruit is amazing! We have bright, juicy berries, plump peaches, dark plums, sweet (and tart cherries). We get blessed with nature’s candy for a few months out of the year and I don’t want to do anything to cover up those flavors. This is where galettes come in. In the galette application, pie crust is basically just there to be a convenient vessel for piles of fruit. It’s crispy and buttery and complementary, but doesn’t take away from the main event.

Pies on the other hand, are where you want a lot of crust. In my humble opinion, fall and winter fruits need a bit of support to shine. Apples are always better basted with spices and pears like to be poached in wine. They need the tender layers of a pie crust to help round everything out.

Anyway, that’s my little speech and it might be a hill I’m ready to die on. You probably won’t catch me making any pies this summer, but galettes will be plentiful.

how to make homemade flaky pie crust

Making a good homemade pie crust is fairly simple, but needs practice. I follow Erin McDowell’s general pie technique and have found it works perfectly every time. Here’s how it works:

1. Toss together your dry ingredients. I like to use a blend of all purpose flour and cake flour because I find it gives a little extra flakiness. You could also use 100% all purpose, or 100% pastry flour, no problem. There’s also a little salt and a little sugar added.

2. Add cubed cold butter. I follow two steps when adding the butter. First, I add all of the butter cubes to the bowl and gently toss it with my fingers so that each piece of butter gets dusted in flour. Then, using my thumbs and forefingers, I flatten each butter cube. When all of the butter has been flattened, I use my finger tips to gently break the pieces down until they are the size of large peas or black beans.

3. Add the ice water. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and drizzle in a few tablespoons of ice water. Most pie recipes call for a range of water to be added—always start on the low end and add more if needed. Toss gently with your fingertips, just to hydrate the dough and then begin to knead gently, adding more water if needed. The dough is ready when you can squeeze a clump in your hand and it stays together when you open your hand.

4. Wrap and chill. Turn your crumbly dough onto a work surface and use the heel of your hand to gently press it into a disc. Your disc should have no dry pockets of flour and you should still be able to see pieces of butter threaded throughout. Wrap it tightly and chill it for at least an hour. Most doughs shrink because they haven’t been sufficiently chilled so give it some time—overnight is best.

tips for making the best summer fruit galettes

I used the most beautiful farmer’s market strawberries for this recipe, but the best thing about galettes is that you can use any fruit you’d like! Here are some tips to make your galettes shine every time.

• Taste your fruit! Natural sweetness varies from fruit to fruit, so taste yours and then adjust the amount of sugar accordingly. In my personal opinion, not much is needed so I usually start with a tablespoon and then add more if needed.

• Add a bit a of cornstarch. Galette juices can be a bit runny, so adding a teaspoon or so of cornstarch will help thicken things up.

• Save some macerated fruit for topping. That’s where the double strawberry part comes in for this recipe. Reserve some of the macerated fruit and spoon it on top of your galettes (along with ice cream) for maximum summer fruit flavor!

Yield: one large galette (9") or four individual galettes

Author: Anna Ramiz

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Double Strawberry Galettes

Prep time: 30 MinCook time: 30 MinInactive time: 1 HourTotal time: 2 Hour

Farmer’s market strawberries are tucked into homemade pie crust to make these miniature double strawberry galettes. Serve with macerated strawberries and vanilla ice cream for an easy, summer dessert.

Ingredients

for the pie crust

• 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp (82 g) all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp (70 g) cake flour
• 2 tsp granulated sugar
• 1/4 tsp kosher salt
• 1/2 cup (113 g) unsalted butter, cold
• 4 tbsp of ice water

for the strawberry galettes

• 1 batch pie dough, recipe included
• 1 lb fresh strawberries
• 2 tbsp sugar
• Juice of 1/2 of a lemon
• 1 tsp cornstarch
• Egg wash
• 2 tbsp demerara sugar

Instructions

to make the pie crust

1. Cube butter and place in a bowl in the freezer while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cake flour, sugar, and salt.
3. Add the butter cubes to the bowl with the dry ingredients and toss them to coat. Using your thumbs and forefinger, flatten each butter piece and begin to work them into the dough until they are the size of black beans. When all of the butter has has been broken dough, make a well in the center of the bowl.
4. Add 3 tbsp of ice water to the bowl and use your fingertips gently toss the mixture until combined. Begin gently kneading the dough, taking care not to overwork it, and adding another tablespoon of water if needed. To test if the dough is moist enough, grab a handful and squeeze it together. If the dough stays clumped together when you open your hand, your dough is ready. If not, add a bit more water and knead a little more.
5. Turn your dough onto a clean work surface and use the heel of your hand to continue gently kneading until there are no more dry patches of flour, but streaks of butter are still visible.
6. Press dough into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap, and chill for at least an hour.
7. When the dough is ready, roll it out on a floured work surface until it is about 1/4” thick.
8. If making one large galette: roll the dough into a circle, roughly 10” in diameter.
9. If making miniature galettes: use a ring or cake pan to cut four 6” circles out of the dough.
10. Place on a parchment lined baking sheet and return to the refrigerator until you are ready to fill and bake.

to make the galettes

1. Preheat the oven to 400° F.
2. Remove the green stems from the strawberries and quarter them. Place berries in a large bowl and toss with sugar, cornstarch, and lemon juice until all of the berries are well-coated. Let rest for 15 minutes.
3. For one large galette: Spoon half of the berry mixture onto the center of your prepared pie crust, leaving at least 1” border around the edge. Fold the edges of the galette up and over the fruit and press to seal. Brush the edges with egg wash and sprinkle with Demerara sugar.
4. For miniature galettes: Spoon about 1/4 cup of berry mixture into the center of each pie crust and fold the edges up and over the fruit. Press to seal and then brush with egg wash and sprinkle with demerara sugar.
5. Bake the galettes for 25-28 minutes, until the crust is deeply golden brown and the fruit mixture is bubbling.
6. Remove from the oven and let cool to room temperature. Serve with vanilla ice cream and a spoonful of the remaining macerated berries.

Notes:

You can substitute any summer fruit that you enjoy in place of strawberries. I recommended tasting your fruit and then adjusting the sugar levels based on the natural sweetness of your fruit.

Pie crust can be made ahead of time and stored in the freezer for up to a week or in the freeze for 3 months.

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Strawberry Marigold Margaritas

It’s margarita season, everyone! Though I appreciate a great margarita all year round, there’s something about time between late-spring and early-summer that makes me crave all things citrus and tequila. Also, if you’re anything like us, margarita season really started somewhere around March 15 this year when we all started being stuck in our home. But today, it’s Cinco De Mayo, and it feels wrong not to be sitting outside in the sun, sipping on margs, so here we are.

I love marigolds and have spent the last few months looking for ways to add these little orange and yellow blossoms to anything and everything coming out of my kitchen. They are slightly floral, a little grassy, and complement almost any bright summer fruit you have hanging around. For this margarita, I cooked them with sugar and water to make a floral simple syrup, that is then added to muddled strawberries, lime juice and tequila for a margarita that just feels like the month of May. If you don’t have marigolds, feel free to substitute another herb or edible flower in its place. Rosemary makes a great simple syrup, rose pairs really beautifully with strawberries…really play around with whatever you have on hand.

And a few more Cinco De Mayo Recipes:

grapefruit and ricotta flan

guava and cheese pastelitos

Strawberry Marigold Margaritas 

Yield: 2 margaritas

Ingredients: 

for the marigold simple syrup:

1/2 cup (100 g) sugar

1/2 cup (100 g) water

1/2 cup (.6 oz) marigold blossoms

for the margaritas: 

4 large strawberries, chopped

2 oz lime juice

1.5 oz marigold syrup 

4 oz tequila 

marigold salt, or regular salt, for rim

Procedure: 

to make the marigold syrup:

1. Combine sugar, water, and marigold blossoms in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat and then simmer until sugar is completely dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool. When completely cool, strain out marigold blossoms. 

to make the margaritas: 

1. To make marigold salt, finely chop the petals from one or two blossoms and combine them with one tablespoon kosher salt. 

2. Muddle two strawberries and 3/4 ounces in the bottom of each glass. Add 1 oz of lime juice, and 2 oz tequila to each glass. Stir to combine and add ice. Enjoy!

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