Miso-Maple Loaf Cake

By Dorie Greenspan

Updated Oct. 11, 2021

Miso-Maple Loaf Cake
Ryan Liebe for The New York Times. Food stylist: Maggie Ruggiero. Prop stylist: Sophia Pappas.
Total Time
1 hour 10 minutes
Rating
4(1,650)
Comments
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This cake, adapted from “Baking With Dorie” (Mariner Books, 2021), is comforting and surprising. The ingredients that give it its name, miso and maple syrup, are strong characters, but they prove themselves good team players. When baked, their flavors are warm and satisfying, mellow and not immediately knowable at first. They hover in that space between sweet and savory. Coarse-crumbed — admirably so — and sturdy, the cake is easy to slice, easy to serve at breakfast and easy to pick up and nibble in the afternoon. It’s as good with butter and jam as it is with a little cheese. And it keeps well: It’ll hold at room temperature for about 4 days.

Featured in: The Haunting Power of Miso-Maple Loaf Cake

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Ingredients

Yield:One 8½-inch loaf
  • 4ounces/113 grams unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for the pan
  • 1¾cups/238 grams all-purpose flour, plus more for the pan
  • 1¾teaspoons baking powder
  • ¼teaspoon baking soda
  • ¾cup/150 grams granulated sugar 
  • ¼teaspoon fine sea salt 
  • Finely grated zest of 1 orange or tangerine 
  • ¼cup/70 grams white or yellow miso 
  • ¼cup/60 milliliters pure maple syrup 
  • 2large eggs, at room temperature 
  • 1½teaspoons pure vanilla extract 
  • ⅓cup/80 milliliters buttermilk (well shaken before measuring)
  • ¼cup/80 grams orange marmalade or apricot jam (optional)
Ingredient Substitution Guide

Preparation

  1. Step 1

    Center a rack in the oven and heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter an 8½-inch loaf pan and dust with flour, or use baker’s spray.

  2. Step 2

    Whisk together the flour, baking powder and baking soda in a medium bowl. Put the sugar, salt and zest in the bowl of a stand mixer or a large bowl that you can use with a hand mixer. Reach in and rub the ingredients together until the sugar is moist and fragrant; it may even turn orange. Add the butter, miso and maple syrup to the sugar. If using a stand mixer, attach the bowl and fit it with the paddle attachment.

  3. Step 3

    Beat on medium speed for about 3 minutes, scraping down the bowl and beater(s) as needed, until the mixture is smooth and creamy. One by one, add the eggs, beating for a minute after each goes in. Beat in the vanilla. The mixture might curdle, but this is a temporary condition. Turn off the mixer, add the dry ingredients all at once and pulse to begin the blending, turning the mixer on and off in very short spurts on the lowest speed. Then, beat on low speed until the dry ingredients are almost incorporated. With the mixer still on low, pour in the buttermilk and blend well. Scrape the batter into the pan, working it into the corners and smoothing the top.

  4. Step 4

    Bake for 50 to 55 minutes, checking the loaf after 40 minutes and covering the top loosely with a foil or tented parchmentif it’s browning too fast. The loaf is properly baked when it pulls away from the sides of the pan and a tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a rack and let the bread rest for 5 minutes, then run a table knife around the edges of the loaf and unmold onto the rack; turn it right side up.

  5. Step 5

    If you’d like to glaze the loaf, stir the marmalade or jam with 1 tablespoon water and heat the mixture in the microwave or over low heat until it comes just to a boil. Using a pastry brush or a spoon, cover the top of the loaf with the glaze. Allow the loaf to cool to room temperature before slicing. Wrapped well, the cake will keep for about 4 days at room temperature. If it becomes stale — and maybe even if it doesn't — toast it lightly before serving. If you haven't glazed the cake, you can wrap it airtight and freeze it for up to 2 months; defrost, still wrapped, at room temperature.

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Ratings

4 out of 5
1,650 user ratings
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Comments

Warren

Whenever I make a dessert that requires a lot of zest, I use a peeler to remove the zest--it comes off beautifully with virtually no pith--and then chop it finely in the food processor along with the granulated sugar. More flavor and less work.

Chantal

I think all miso is considered paste. Re. color: The darker the color the saltier and flavor-intense the miso. Red miso has an intense salty flavor, white miso is sweeter and less intense. Yellow sits somewhere in-between. Given that others have lamented that the miso and maple flavors are not pronounced enough in this cake, I'd opt for yellow if you can find it.

DF

Nice loaf, good texture, easy enough. Still "haunting"? Not really. I would have preferred a pronounced maple taste, and, if I make it again, I will use a tsp of maple extract to boost that flavor.

Jennifer

Made as directed, (50min) and added glaze of 2TBS maple syrup to 1TBS miso (whisked over heat til bubbling and melted) which I brushed on once the cake has cooled. Delish. Feels grown up and savory!

Donna C.

I think the taste of the miso is a little bit too strong and takes over the more delicate maple. I decrease the amount of miso by 1 tablespoon.

Deedee

My loaf was ready at the 40 mark!

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Credits

Adapted from “Baking With Dorie,” by Dorie Greenspan (Mariner Books, 2021).

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