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The return of cake club. Plum and orange


Yes its back, krow's Cake club; Goswell Road's most fiercely contested culinary competition.
I know I'm breaking the first rule of cake club but it's me versus new boy, Chris Hurdiss. Something tells me the boy can bake, so instead of the usual 'go for it with no test' approach, this time I am using a cold Saturday to give the River Cafe plum and orange cake a dry run.

Its just out of the oven ... too hot to try but looking ok .... we'll see.

Anyway here's the recipe from River cafe Easy


Plum filling:
500 g ripe plums
50 g caster sugar
juice and zest of one orange
1 vanilla pod
Cake:
150 g unsalted butter
150 g caster sugar
2 eggs
85 g self raising flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
100 g almonds, finely ground
Almond topping:
30 g unsalted butter
25 g demerara sugar
zest of one orange
50 g flaked almonds
Preheat the oven to 180C / Gas 4
  • Halve and stone the plums and put in an ovenproof dish with the sugar, the orange juice and rind. Add the split vanilla pod and bake for 20 minutes. Cool. Scrape in the vanilla seeds.
  • Grease a 25cm round spring-form tin, lined with parchment paper, with extra butter.
  • Soften the butter and beat with the sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one by one. Fold in the flour, baking powder and ground almonds.
  • Pour into the tin [it will be a thin layer] and push the plums and their juices into and over the cake. [I put a baking tray underneath in case any juices escaped.] Bake in the oven for half an hour.
  • For the topping, finely grate the orange rind. Melt the butter and stir in the sugar, zest and flaked almonds. Spread this over the half-baked cake, lower the heat to 160C / Gas 3 and bake for a further 20 minutes. Cool the cake in the tin.
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Comments

Unknown said…
Looks delicious and what better thing to do on such a miserable cold Saturday (my husband is fixing guttering which is a seriously bad idea weatherwise, I think it's just started snowing). Just logged on to get lamb recipe for tonight - daughter No 2 down from Newcastle for weekend as 1st major exam on Monday, which five weeks into her first term doesn't entirely seem like cricket to me but she says it's a 'red hot poker'... Lulu
October 27, 2012 at 4:34 PM
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