Vanilla butter cake with rhubarb, cherries and crumble topping

A wonderful, delicate vanilla cake studded with pink rhubarb and sour cherries, topped with a fragrant vanilla crumble. The perfect bake to celebrate the start of rhubarb season! You will fall in love with this cake — it is soft, moist and packed with plenty of tart fruit. And do not skip the vanilla; it complements the flavour of rhubarb beautifully.

Ingredients for the cake:

• 125 g butter
• 120–150 g vanilla caster sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 180 g plain flour
• 60 g potato starch (or cornflour)
• 1½ tsp baking powder
• 90 g sour cream (12–18% fat)
• 400 g rhubarb, cut into approximately 2 cm pieces
• 300 g cherries, thawed and well drained

All ingredients should be at room temperature. Sift together the plain flour, potato starch and baking powder, then set aside.

Place the butter and sugar into the bowl of a stand mixer and beat for several minutes until very pale and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add the sifted dry ingredients alternately with the sour cream, in two batches, mixing only until combined. Alternatively, fold everything together gently with a spatula.

Grease and line a 23 x 30 cm baking tin with baking parchment. Spread the batter evenly into the prepared tin. The layer of batter will be relatively shallow. Arrange the rhubarb and cherries evenly over the surface. Sprinkle generously with the crumble topping.

Bake at 170°C for approximately 40–45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Remove from the oven, leave to cool slightly, then slice and serve.

Ingredients for the vanilla crumble topping:

• 100 g plain flour
• 50 g vanilla caster sugar
• 60 g butter, melted

Place all the ingredients in a bowl and rub together with your fingertips until a crumbly mixture forms.

* If you do not have homemade vanilla sugar, use caster sugar and the seeds scraped from 1 vanilla pod instead.

Enjoy!