Everyday Chocolate Cake

Days and weeks are whizzing by, and our heads are barely screwed on around here. They were on in March. I exercised in March. I ate healthy(ish) meals in March. I knocked off to-dos in March. But sometime after March things became a blur, and now here we are, squeezing in email responses in bed before falling asleep, grabbing for yet another Trader Joe's frozen meal, letting the post office pile pile up. There's a light at the end of the tunnel, though. I see it. We're driving to Saint Louis tonight for a not-even-full-day trip, and I'm looking forward to listening to some podcasts and grilling Brian with a million "what if..." questions. We're also getting massages for the first time on Saturday and can't wait for a relaxing date night after.

After weeks of neglecting the kitchen, I jumped in last Saturday and made this chocolate loaf, and even though I gave up sweets this year, and even though I've recently been advised to eat as gluten free as possible (more on that later, it's haaaaard), I dove straight into it on Mother's Day. Despite my love for sugar, I'm not much of a cake person, even less a chocolate cake person, but this is so rich, so simple, so ... comforting? And, because of it, consider me a Dutch cocoa convert. Cya, other cocoas.

Ingredients (makes one loaf): 
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup Dutch cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Butter and lightly flour a 9x5x3-inch loaf pan, or spray it with a butter-flour spray.

In a large bowl, on medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugars and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the egg and beat well, then the buttermilk and vanilla. Don't worry if the batter looks a little uneven.

Sift the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt together right into your wet ingredients. Stir together with a spoon until well-blended, but do not overmix.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Bake for 60-70 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Cool in pan on a rack for 10-15 minutes, at which point you can cool it the rest of the way out of the pan. Serve with whipped cream and fresh berries, if you're feeling fancy.