You may find that brown butter spice cake is the perfect ending to your meal, as this type of cake provides the savory taste of browned butter in sweet cake. However, it is quite high in calories, fat and cholesterol, as well as sodium, which may make it inappropriate for a healthy diet.
Calories
One serving -- roughly 1/12 of the total recipe -- of brown butter spice cake contains about 420 calories. This is quite high, which may make this dessert inappropriate for some diets. Adult meals typically contain 300 to 600 calories, so if you consume brown butter spice cake as part of a meal, you must either eat a smaller piece of cake or prepare a very low-calorie meal to accompany the dessert.
Macronutrients
Brown butter spice cake contains 53.5 g of carbs per serving. Carbohydrates provide you with energy. You should take in 225 to 325 g of carbohydrates each day; however, you should obtain your carbs from healthy foods like whole grains and fruits and vegetables -- not refined grains and sugar as provided by cakes and many other desserts. One serving of this cake also contains 22 g of fat, 13 g of which are saturated. You should limit your consumption of this type of fat to approximately 22 g daily if you follow a 2,000 calorie diet, as it can increase your risk of type-2 diabetes and contribute to high cholesterol. You will not get much in the way of protein from this cake -- 1 slice provides just 4 g.
Cholesterol
Some people are readily affected by the amount of cholesterol in the foods they consume, which can raise blood cholesterol levels and increase the risk of heart disease. For this reason, you should consume less than 300 mg of cholesterol per day. A serving of brown butter spice cake provides approximately half this amount, coming in at 140 mg of cholesterol per portion. If you consume a diet high in cholesterol, consider eating a smaller piece of cake or skipping dessert all together.
Sodium
A 1-slice serving of brown butter spice cake contains 220 mg of sodium. Consuming too much sodium may increase your risk of heart attacks, hypertension and strokes. The American Heart Association states that you should aim to keep your sodium intake to 1,500 mg per day.
References
- Cooking Club of America; Brown Butter Spice Cake; L. Chattman
- The Diet Channel; Calories: What's An Ideal Daily Intake?; Michele Turcotte, MS, RD/LDN
- MayoClinic.com; Healthy Diet: End the Guesswork With These Nutrition Guidelines; February 2011
- McKinley Health Center; Macronutrients: the Importance of Carbohydrate, Protein, and Fat; March 2008
- Harvard Medical School: Fats and Cholesterol: Out with the Bad, In with the Good
- U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; High Blood Pressure; February 2011
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