Dairy-Free Citrus Cake

There's a few flavours in life that I can't live without. Chocolate. Cinnamon. Citrus. Obviously I can't combine all three flavours in one cake - that would just be wrong. So this cake is citrus. And dairy-free. And super soft. And super yummy.

In the ingredients, I've listed citrus zest and juice. Personally, I've made this cake using just oranges and a combination of orange and lemon. There's also no reason this wouldn't work with limes or mandarins so play about with the flavours to suit your own taste.

Dairy-Free Citrus Cake

2/3 cup caster sugar
2 large eggs (use 3 if they're only small)
4 tspn citrus zest, finely grated (If you love a strong citrus flavour, add an extra tspn or 2!)
1/2 cup good quality olive oil
1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
1/4 cup soy milk
1/4 cup citrus juice

Preheat the oven to 190C (or 170C if you have a fan-forced oven). Grease and line the tin with baking paper. (Make sure you line your tin completely - bottom and sides - as this cake is uber soft and may stick otherwise.)

Using electric beaters, beat the sugar and eggs together for a couple of minutes until the mixture is thick and frothy. Beat in the citrus zest and olive oil.

Stir in the flour, milk and juice then pour the mixture into the cake tin.

Bake the cake for 50 minutes ot until it's golden on top. Test it's baked through by inserting a skewer - if should come out cleanly with only moist crumbs sticking to it.

Let the cake cool in the tin for 10-15 minutes then turn it onto a wire rack to finish cooling completely. Finish by dusting it with icing sugar.

Childhood Birthday Cakes

I recently heard the news that the Australian Women's Weekly is reprinting their Children's Birthday Cake Book - this book was a staple in our house and every year I would eagerly flick through the book and choose the birthday cake I wanted Mum to make for me.

This post is a nostalgic trip down memory lane for me and I wanted to share the cakes the Mum made for her children during the 1980s.

Did your Mum use the AWW Childrens Birthday Cake Book?

Carrot Cake

Apologies for the prolonged break in recipe blogging - we were busy moving house but we've now settled into our new place and regular programming shall now continue.

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I've always been a big fan of carrot cake ever since I was a kid (although Mum was more into making melting moments and jam tarts) and I've finally found the ultimate recipe. It's moist, packed with flavour and contains a vegetable (always a bonus, it helps to cancel out all the sugar. ;p )



Carrot Cake

1 cup vegetable oil
1 1/3 cups soft brown sugar
3 eggs
3 cups grated carrot
1 cup chopped walnuts
Zest of 1 lemon
Zest of 1 orange
2 1/4 cups self-raising flour
1 1/2 tspn bi-carb soda
1 tbsp ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 180C. Grease and line a 20cm round cake tin.

In a large bowl beat together the vegetable oil, brown sugar and eggs for 5 minutes or until the mixture looks creamy.

With a wooden spoon stir in the grated carrot, walnuts and fruit zest then stir in flour, bi-carb and cinnamon.

Tip the mixture into the prepared cake tin and bake for 30 minutes, or until a wooden skewer inserted comes out clean. Let the cake cool for 10 minutes in the tin then turn it out onto a wire rack to cool completely before icing it.

Cream Cheese Icing

40g butter
120g soft cream cheese
1/2 tspn vanilla extract
2 cups icing sugar

Cream the butter for a minute then add the cream cheese, vanilla and 1 cup of icing sugar. Beat the icing with an electric mixer for 4 minutes then add the second cup of icing sugar and beat for a further 4 minutes. Spread the icing over the cake then sprinkle with some brown sugar or a little more cinnamon.

Enjoy a really big slice of this cake with a cup of tea or coffee. :)

Ugly Mudcake

Mudcake.

The word brings about memories of rich chocolate cake purchased from the "gourmet" bakery in the "better" suburbs for a girly afternoon tea, usually to celebrate a friend's birthday.

Unfortunately, as beautifully decorated as these cakes usually are with their shiny layer of chocolate ganache and curls of white or dark (or sometimes both) grated chocolate, the insides would often be dry, dense, sickly sweet and taste a little bit processed. Bakeries often use a variety of cake/bread improvers, sugar syrups, preservatives and artificial flavours in their products to make the product more "stable" when baking, to make it last longer and to make it cheaper to produce.

So instead of trying to replicate a beautiful but tasteless cake, I'm going to tell you how to make the most gorgeous-tasting, but super ugly, chocolate mudcake!

Ugly Mudcake
(Serves 8-10)

220g butter
320g chocolate buttons (milk or dark)
1/4 cup boiling water
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 cup caster sugar
4 eggs (only use 3 if they are 60g each or more)
1 cup self-raising flour

Preheat your oven to 150C. Grease a round cake pan and line the bottom with baking paper.

In a microwave safe bowl, melt the butter and chocolate with the water. Let it cool for a few minutes, then mix in the cocoa powder and sugar.

Gently stir in the eggs, followed by the flour.

Pour the mixture into the pan and let it sit for a few minutes before putting it in the oven. This will let some of the air-bubbles that have been stirred in rise to the surface so your cake will bake evenly.

Bake the cake for 1 1/4 hours (or until a skewer inserted comes out cleanly, with only moist crumbs clinging to it.) Let it cool in the pan for 15 minutes before turning it out onto a wire rack to finish cooling.

The result will be a mudcake that is NOT pretty. It has a habit of sinking a little in the middle no matter what I do. I've tried using more flour, baking powder, bi-carb soda - nothing will help it look prettier. But for all its ugliness, it's one of the BEST chocolate cakes I've ever made.

Ice it with a simple chocolate ganache if you'd like, but I never do. I prefer to cut a wedge, heat it a little in the microwave then serve it with some double thick cream or vanilla ice-cream.

Lemon Loaf

I felt like cooking something sweet a couple of weeks ago, but since it had recently been Easter and I was still suffering a chocolate overdose, I didn't really want to cook with that which usually runs through my veins!

It was late at night (no shops were open to get fresh ingredients) so I had to make do with what I had in the pantry. I had the basics and a few lemons knocking about the fruit drawer of the fridge. After going through a few cookbooks and my fave recipe website I settled on a lemon loaf recipe from the Taste.com.au.

Six ingredients and an hour later, I was sitting down with a big cup of tea and munching on a lovely warm piece of cake.

The cake itself was gorgeous! It was light and fluffy with a wonderful sweet/sour topping made by combining some lemon juice and sugar. This cake is one my darling Pete has practically begged me to make again. (A sure sign this recipe is a keeper!)

You can get the recipe here: http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/9184/lemon+loaf