Baking cakes without flour

[shewhomust]

For artistatlarge and sinfulkitten, by request.

I use two recipes taken from Claudia Roden's Book of Middle Eastern Food (one of my favourite cookbooks; I have worn out one copy, and the replacement is looking the worse for wear!). She describes them as Sephardic in origin, and intended for Passover (hence the absence of flour).

Orange and Almond Cake

2 large oranges
6 eggs
250g / 8 oz almonds
250g / 8 oz sugar (I use 5 oz fructose)
1 teaspoon baking powder (check for wheat free; trust no-one!)
Butter and more almonds / cornflour, for the tin

Prepare tin (preferably with removable base): line, butter, dredge with almonds / cornflour. Set oven to moderately hot (190° c / 375° F / mark 5).

Wash and boil the whole oranges in a little water until soft (nearly 2 hours, she says, or use a pressure cooker, in which case half an hour). Let them cool, then cut open, remove pips, and reduce to pulp in a blender or by hand.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl. Add all other ingredients, pour into tin, bake - the recipe says about an hour or longer. In my experience it's longer, and still gives quite a moist cake.

Chocolate Cake

250g / 8 oz bitter / plain chocolate
2 tablespoons milk (to melt the chocolate; if you'd rather use a liqueur / spirits, go ahead)
120g / 4 oz ground almonds (or use a proportion of ground walnuts / hazelnuts)
6 tablespoons sugar (or less fructose)
6 eggs, separated
Butter and more almonds / cornflour, for the tin

Prepare tin (preferably with removable base): line, butter, dredge with almonds / cornflour. Set oven to moderate (180° c / 350° F / mark 4).

Melt the chocolate with the milk in a double saucepan / bowl over boiling water. Off the heat, stir in the nuts, sugar and egg yolks. Beat well - if the mixture is too stiff, slacken it off with a little milk, or the air from the egg whites will be knocked out of it, and the cake denser than in should be. Beat egg whites until stiff, and fold in.

Pour into tin, bake. Again, the recipe says three quarters of an hour to an hour - I think it's usually a bit longer. You can dredge sugar over the top when it's cool, if you want to.

She also gives a recipe for Coconut Cake, which also sounds good, if you like coconut.

Comments

[lamentables.livejournal.com]

*takes notes*

I'm always interested in gluten-free recipes.

I have a similar recipe for chocolate brownies using ground almonds, but the sweetening is done with puréed dates. Interested?

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

For myself, I'm more interested in sugar-free recipes, so yes, please!

(My Christmas cake recipe is sweetened with dates and dried apricots, but I seem to have lost my recipe for sugar-free gingerbread, made with figs.)

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

I have a dairy free chocolate cake and a baking powder free orange-almond cake recipe if your friends need. Also biscuits. The combination of being Jewish and having an uncle who was coeliac means we used to have a plethora or recipes, but my one gluten intolerant friend isn't interested, so I share the recipes elsewhere when I can. Mind you, the basic cakes are very similar to yours - they're the two most popular Pasover cake recipes I've come across.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Note from the realms of Great Coincidence: the cake I made at the weekend - for my dairy-free friends, as it happens - is more or less a hybrid of these two. A chocolate, orange and almond cake, with the boiled oranges (one hour is enough, I find, in a simple lidded saucepan) and cocoa and lots of real chocolate too. And an apricot glaze. It's yummy, and I've been eating it all week and there's still a lot left (a narrow slice is plenty, I find). Happily, it seems to be surviving the passage of time in near-perfect condition, thus far...

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

It's one of the virtues of these rather dense cakes, that they do last well. Lightness is overrated, I think.

And thanks for the timing on the no-pressure cooking. Two hours did seem an awful lot...

[anef.livejournal.com]

Nigella makes a version of the orange cake with clementines in - it's one of my favourite cakes, and so easy.

The chocolate cake looks yummy. Must try. Ah, but then I'd have to eat it.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

Ah, but then I'd have to eat it.

I'm sure we could round up some help...

[artistatlarge.livejournal.com]

Oh, thank you so much!

The first recipe is very like Nigella Lawson's Clementine Cake, which I already make (and adore)... but that chocolate cake is a new one, and it sounds completely decadent.

Coconut: it's a funny thing, isn't it- people seem to love it or loathe it. I'm definitely in the Love camp. :-)

Next time my friend comes over, I can wow her with homebaked goodness, I will look like a star, thanks to you, kind lady. :-)

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

My pleasure! And yes, I'm fond of coconut - my father disliked it, so it's one of the dislikes I'm very conscious of.