The best apricot cake I’ve ever made
One more week of the school holidays to go. At this time of the year I always have mixed feelings: sad, as it’s so nice just to hang out with the kids and not have to rush anywhere, but also happy, because I’ll have more time to work on my blog and the kids will be too busy being back at school to fight with each other. While they’re busy with a couple of those I-devices, I thought I’d get this recipe up for Torta di Albicocca (apricot cake) before the apricots are out of season. Nothing worse than reading about a delicious recipe that you can’t make because the ingredients aren’t available!
I love cooked apricots. Their taste condenses a lot when they are cooked, and with this apricot cake, it’s no exception. The cake is simple and showcases the apricots to the full advantage of your taste-buds! You could of course use any other juicy stone-fruit in their place, but do try it with the apricots. No real reason, except for the fact that it’s really, really, really good! Whenever I make this cake it disappears before I can steal a piece to take a photo of it for the blog (actually, I mean: to keep for myself so that I can eat it for breakfast the next day).
A cake that takes no time to make, and why Chardonnay grape seeds are good for hamsters
This cake can be whipped up in a hurry, which is a big bonus, plus it looks and tastes wonderful. It has no butter in it, so it could almost be considered healthy……..well, OK, it’s a cake after all, so don’t get your hopes up too much. If you want healthy, just eat the apricots and forget about the rest. I used grape-seed oil, but any oil with no taste will work fine. If you’re wondering: no, I’d never heard of grape-seed oil either. Some friends left a bottle of it behind after staying at our place. It has a lovely greenish colour, and seems very “light”. On Wikipedia it says that it’s relatively good for you (as opposed to other oils), and that hamsters that ate Chardonnay grape seeds managed to avoid becoming obese on a high-fat diet. Hmmmm….I wonder if that works if you drink Chardonnay too? I think I could be onto something!
Notes on making apricot cake
For this cake, I use the cake tin you can see in the photo above. It’s 25cm (10 inches). You could use a slightly smaller one or a bigger one, depending on what’s in your kitchen cupboard, or how thick (or thin) you want the cake to be. You’ll need to vary the cooking time accordingly. For a larger tin, the cooking time will be less as the cake is thinner. Just stick a knife or a skewer in it every so often to test it after the first 20 minutes. If it comes out clean, take the cake out of the oven.
Travel Photo Of The Week
Thinking of Summer: here’s the Travel Photo of the Week: The beautiful beaches of the island of Sardenia. This was taken about ten years ago and at that time, there was nobody around, even though it was the middle of Summer. I’m not sure if it’s still like that now. It’s amazing to be able to find empty places like this in Europe!
Just thinking of this apricot cake is making my mouth water, and I have some apricots sitting on the bench….I know what I’m going to do today!
By Lisa Watson
Apricot cake
Ingredients
- 300 g Flour 2 1/2 cups cake flour best; all-purpose works too
- 180 g White sugar 3/4 cup + 2 Tbsp
- 4 tsp Baking powder
- 1 pinch Salt
- Zest from 1 lemon
- 3 Eggs
- 60 ml Milk 1/4 cup
- 150 ml Oil 2/3 cup – use a tasteless oil. I used grape-seed oil.
- 1 tsp Vanilla extract or 1 packet vanilla sugar
- 10 – 15 Apricots depending on their size
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 180ºC (350ºF).
- Beat the eggs, salt, vanilla essence and sugar with a standing mixer or an eggbeater at high speed until they become fluffy and whitish in colour.
- While still beating, add the milk and oil in a thin stream.
- Add the flour, zest and baking powder. Mix in gently until combined.
- Put in a greased 25cm ( 10 inch ) cake tin.
- Cut the apricots in half and place them over the top of the cake batter.
- Bake for approximately 30 – 40 minutes until a tester comes out clean.
- Let sit for 5 minutes before turning out onto a rack to cool.