The story behind this cake is quite funny in its own way. My mother was craving something sweet and asked me to bake a cake for the evening. So I raided the kitchen cupboards, checked what ingredients were available, and this is what emerged.

At first, while making it, I didn’t think it was anything particularly groundbreaking, so I didn’t even bother writing the recipe down. I figured it was just an ordinary countryside cake — cozy and sweet, but nothing extraordinary. But the end result was unexpectedly delicious! While happily devouring the cake afterward, I tried to remember everything I had thrown into it, grabbed a pen, and — lacking a better option — scribbled the recipe onto the back of a grocery receipt

The ingredients came together entirely from what happened to be on hand. Since the village shop didn’t carry lactose-free butter or any other fancy ingredients suitable for me, coconut oil from the pantry took over the role of fat in the cake. For moisture and texture, I used sweet potato, which also adds vitamins and a lovely softness. A little baking soda helped lift the cake, and the flour of choice became raw buckwheat flour — of which I had apparently managed to haul about five kilos into my mother’s pantry over the course of several months.

Among the people enjoying the cake at the table was a ballroom dancer, who was particularly delighted — finally, a tasty cake with reasonably balanced nutrients that could still fit into a fairly strict diet in moderation. That’s exactly what I aim for: besides being healthier, a proper cake first and foremost has to taste insanely good. Nobody needs those cardboard-like “free-from-everything” cakes