Cheryl Willoughby's White Cake with Buttermilk Frosting

This is another recipe from my "mom" files. It's kind of like your basic white sauce: you can enjoy this cake just as it is, or use it as the starting point for much more creative things. Add some flavoring, decorate it, make it a split-layer, jelly-filled cake...use your imagination! Best of all, it's very moist, and even if you do nothing else it's fancy enough for most occasions without any other embellishments.

Ingredients:

2 cups flour
1 cup white sugar
1 tsp. baking soda
¼ tsp. salt
1 cup water
2 Tbsp. buttermilk
1/3 cup veg. or canola oil
1 tsp. white vinegar
3 eggs
1 ¼ Tbsp. vanilla

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Whisk dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Separately, blend wet ingredients together. Gradually add the wet ingredients to the dry, mixing well until the lumps are gone. Pour into a greased/floured 8 x 8 pan.

Bake for around 45 minutes or until a knife inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean.

Turn upside down on a cooling rack, let sit and cool until the cake can easily be shaken down onto the cooling rack.

When cool, ice with buttercream frosting: mix together ½ stick butter (softened!), about 2 ½ cups powdered sugar, and just enough buttermilk to make the icing soft and pliable.