Easy Delicious Rhubarb Cake

This is a classic single-layer rhubarb cake with a serious vintage feel, the kind that turns up in Midwestern church cookbooks and gets photocopied across generations. Brown sugar and sour cream do the bulk of the work, giving the crumb a moist, slightly tangy lean that plays against the sour bite of fresh rhubarb folded through the batter.

The topping is the unexpected detail. Old-school mace, the lacy outer husk of nutmeg, gets crushed with a few sugar lumps and scattered over the top before baking. As it melts in the oven, it crusts into sweet, fragrant pebbles that give the cake a confectioner’s finish without any frosting at all.

Serve warm with whipped cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream when rhubarb is at its peak in late spring.

Pro Tips

• Use only the red and pink stalks of rhubarb; the leaves are toxic and the woody base is stringy
• Chop rhubarb into half-inch pieces; bigger pieces release too much liquid and make the crumb soggy
• Sour cream at room temperature blends in smoother than cold, no streaks in the batter
• If sugar lumps are hard to find, smash a few teaspoons of granulated sugar into coarse crumbs by hand
• This cake is just as good cold from the fridge the next day; the rhubarb mellows overnight

Variations

• Stir a half-cup of fresh strawberries into the rhubarb for the classic pairing
• Substitute ground cardamom for the mace for a Scandinavian twist
• Add a quarter cup of toasted sliced almonds with the topping for crunch