Easter Bunny Marble Cake

Yesterday we dyed our first Easter eggs, today I baked  Easter Bunny Marble Cakes using a straightforward Marble Cake recipe.

I was given this recipe in 1989 and have been using it ever since. It is a very versatile recipe, it can be used to bake Marble Cakes in a variety of different baking pans.

Recipe for Marble Cake
(this recipe can be baked in a 10 cup Bundt pan, springform or loaf pan)

Ingredients

200 g (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature
170 g (3/4 cup) superfine sugar
1 package pure vanilla sugar (or 2 tsp pure vanilla extract)
4 eggs, use organic or free range whenever possible finely grated zest of a lemon, use organic if possible
200 g (1 1/2 cups) AP flour, sifted
1/8 tsp fine salt (I use fine sea salt)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder

For the chocolate dough add:
2 tbsp dutch process cocoa powder
2 tbsp superfine sugar
3 tbsp milk, room temperature


Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit (175 degrees Celsius).

2. Butter and flour your baking pan.

3. In the bowl of your electric mixer, beat the butter until creamy.

4. Add the sugar and continue to beat until the mixture is light and fluffy, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.

5. Beat in the vanilla sugar or extract.

6. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

7. Beat in the lemon zest.

8. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, the salt and the baking powder.

9. With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix only until combined.

10. Pour half the batter into the prepared pan. To the other half add the cocoa powder, sugar and milk and mix only until combined. Do not overmix.

11. Add the chocolate batter to the vanilla batter in the pan and carefully draw swirls through the batter to marbleize it.

12. Bake for 45 to 60 minutes.

13. Place on a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes before removing the cake from the pan to cool completely.

14. Decorate as desired.