My love for baking started very young. Before I could even talk, I was in a high-chair at the kitchen counter while my Memaw made her southern family specialties—banana pudding, pineapple upside-down cake, snickerdoodles, and, one of my personal favorites, this Sock-It-To-Me Cake. It’s basically a pecan coffee cake loaded with butter flavor. And best of all, it uses a boxed cake mix which makes it incredibly easy.

I’m so happy to still have all my Memaw’s handwritten recipes cards. I often sort through them and think about all the wonderful memories I have of her cooking. Many of them are still covered in spills from active kitchen duty. I love to incorporate her old kitchen tools like this vintage bundt pan, metal clip, and cake server into my own baking. Memaw was also very talented at crocheting and I used one of her doilies for displaying the finished cake.

The best memories of my life are of Memaw and I in the kitchen. I can feel the tradition and history in every bite.

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Sock-It-To-Me Cake

Ingredients

1 box Duncan Hines Butter Cake Mix

1/2 cup sugar

4 eggs

1 cup sour cream

3/4 cup vegetable oil

1 Tbsp butter flavoring

1 cup chopped pecans

2 tsp cinnamon

2 Tbsp sugar

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a bundt pan. Mix the cake mix, 1/2 cup sugar, eggs, sour cream, vegetable oil, and butter flavoring in a large bowl until smooth. Stir in the chopped pecans. Pour half the batter into the prepared bundt pan. In a small bowl, mix the cinnamon and 2 Tbsp sugar. Sprinkle on top of the batter. Pour the remaining batter in the pan. Bake for about 45 minutes to an hour, or until cake it set. Remove from oven and let cool in the pan about 10 minutes then carefully flip over cake onto a wire rack to cool.

Photography by Erika Mattingly Photography