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Saturday 1 January 2011

Happy New Year Cake

The yummy citrus scented batter. I used an electric blender for this cake (I usually just beat by hand).
The cake after it came out of the oven. It spent almost 3 hours in there! First 45 minutes covered with a foil 'tent', then out to put the nuts on, another 90 minutes, then apply a brandy and sugar wash, then a final 15 minutes. Worth waiting for!

The crumb is a lovely golden colour and beautifully moist, and light but not at all crumbly.

Close up of the cherries. Confession- I love glace cherries. I know they're more sweets than fruit. And I don't care.

This cake was a real revelation for me, the complexity of the flavours and the amazing texture has landed this cake right up there above even chocolate cake. My tastes have definitely changed, these days I'd rather have a fruit or ginger cake than a victoria sponge with buttercream or a chocolate cake. If you'd like to try this Dundee cake out, here's the recipe and the instructions. I saved the recipe a year ago and I'm only making it now! There were some small departures from the original and I used vegan subs obviously. I used egg replacer powder for the eggs and also the juice of an orange and a few tablespoons of soya milk, Sainsbury's own brand Free from spread for the butter, homemade grapefruit marmalade, 2 tablespoons of apple brandy (Calvados) in the mix and I brushed the top with brandy and sugar rather than milk and sugar.
I should also point you in the direction of the cake's creator, Dan Lepard. Click the link to go to his website. He has a great column in the Guardian every saturday.
Happy New Year, may it bring plenty of yummy cakes!

Oh, P.S.-did you see Toast on the BBC during the week?? It was a film of the autobiography of my favourite food writer. Check it out if you haven't already.

4 comments:

  1. That cake looks awesome! I'm so happy that you have found the right diet that works for you. I'm not sure if I've said but I've started a similar approach to you these last few days and already I'm noticing a difference :) let's hope it won't take too long to become stable.

    I missed Toast; I really wanted to watch it but it clashed with something that Tom wanted to watch.

    Fave apples are cox and gala. Although sometimes I love a good pink lady... that sounds so weird! Lol. xxx

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  2. Hi Sarah, glad the diet change is still working, I hope it's the solution for you, it's great when you find something that works after years of searching.
    By the way, you should be able to get Toast on iplayer still.

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  3. That cake sounds complex! Nice accomplishment!!! I'm not into fruity things, but it looks moist and tasty. :)

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  4. It's deceptively easy- mix batter, pour into cake tin, take out and top with soaked almonds, bake again. If you ever visit the UK, I'll make you veggie cake instead;)

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