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Only one recipe this week - Michael says I’m slacking. But it’s so delicious and seasonal that it’s worth two. I sometimes find honey cake heavy and dense, but this recipe is light and moist. These cakes are traditionally baked for Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and whilst there are numerous different recipes, this moist, flavoursome cake always has honey, in the hope that the New Year will be sweet.
Nuts can be added for texture and apples are often used. Here, the flavouring is tea, but you could use coffee, rum or brandy and lemon/orange zest. It’s good to make a day or two ahead so the flavours develop and mature.
Ingredients:
175g plain flour
100g honey
80g sugar
80ml vegetable oil
40g golden syrup
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
½ cup warm tea
½ tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
¼ tsp ground cloves
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
¼ tsp salt
2 eggs
* optional almond slices to scatter on top
Method:
Preheat oven to 170⁰C. Grease and line a 2lb cake tin.
Prepare ½ a cup of tea and leave to cool. In a bowl mix the flour, baking powder, bicarb of soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and salt. In another bowl, (with whisk attachment), whisk the eggs, sugar, honey and golden syrup on high until light and fluffy. Turn the speed down to low and while it is still on, slowly add the oil and vanilla. Whisk until well incorporated.
Change attachment to beater and add a third of the flour mixture, beat and then add half of the tea, and mix in. Repeat with another third of flour, the rest of the tea and finally the remaining flour. Beat until you have a smooth consistency, but don’t over mix.
Pour the batter into the prepared tin, scatter the almonds and place in the oven for appx 40-45mins. A skewer inserted will come out clean when the cake is ready.
Take out the oven, leave to cool a little and then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Enjoy.
Gaby Van Clarke
None of us know what’s going to take us out. Life’s full of surprises. But we do know that the body starts to degenerate from about age 30 (more cells destroyed than created, barring excess weight gain) and also, crucially, that we can affect the speed of that ageing process.
Introduced by Portuguese merchants in the 16th century, and adapted over time to suit Japanese tastes, this light bouncy sponge is considered a traditional Japanese speciality. More delicate and airy than a regular sponge cake, castella ( カステラ, kasutera) is famous for a fine and moist crumb.
