Clementine & almond cake with kombucha-pickled cherries
Damp, delightfully fragrant, and full of character.
This cake is a stunner.
We have Claudia Roden to thank; she was first given the recipe in 1960, eventually tracing its origins from the Iberian peninsula all the way back to Sephardic Jews in Aleppo. Nigella then adapted it to use clementines instead of oranges; it’s entirely gluten and dairy free, but neither are missed. The special touch that makes it stand out from all the other cakes in your repertoire? It uses whole citrus fruit - oranges, clementines, or mandarins - rind and pith and all! (Just not the pips - nothing can make those palatable!).
Cooking the citrus fruit by boiling or microwaving them removes the bitterness from the pith and softens up the whole fruit so it’s easily blitzed up into a purée; it contributes incredible moisture to the cake, keeping it super moist for, well, as long as it takes you to eat it (probably not very long at all).
I’ve given it a few tweaks and additions to make it suit my tastes. I’ve replaced the caster sugar with a combination of dates and either coconut or date sugar - both of which are less refined than processed white sugar and more flavorsome. You could also use muscovado sugar, and you could omit the dates and replace them weight for weight with your chosen sugar. I then added some orange blossom water which pairs so beautifully with the citrus and almonds, along with some homemade noyau - for those unfamiliar, noyau is an infusion of stone fruit kernels in a neutral liquor, those kernels containing similar flavor compounds to almonds (it’s what is used to flavor Disaronno). I just collect the pits from apricots, peaches, and plums, crack them open then let the tender kernels infuse in vodka for ages. Noyau goes into as much of my baking as possible.
As for the cherries? This was a surprisingly lovely last-minute experiment. I had a glut of gorgeous ruby cherries to use up, as well as a large quantity of my rooibos kombucha. The kombucha was pretty acidic, so I decided to pickle the cherries in the liquid - pickling, after all, is an umbrella term for anything preserved in an acidic medium, and aged kombucha definitely counts as an acid! 24 hours later, the cherries had not only softened but had also taken on the most delightful tangy flavour…I think the rooibos base worked really well here. You could do this with virtually any fruit or vegetable, even onions, provided the base flavour of your kombucha pairs well with it! Peaches and white tea kombucha, I’m eyeing you up next!
And some pretty interesting stuff started to happen with those kombucha cherries the longer they sat in the liquid…I’ll be sharing it all in my next newsletter in two weeks time, so stay tuned!
Clementine & ground almond cake
Ingredients
2 clementines (325-350g)
90g dates
100g coconut sugar, date sugar, or muscovado sugar
250g ground almonds
6 eggs
1 tsp baking powder
1.5 tsp orange blossom water
1 tsp noyau
Instructions
Score your citrus and microwave them in a bowl with a little water at the bottom, on high for 10 min.
Let them cool then chop into small pieces, picking out the pips. If you’re using a food processor, blend the fruit with the dates and the orange blossom water. If you’re using a blender, like a nutribullet, add 2 eggs as well.
Add to a large bowl, then stir in the almonds and the sugar.
Whip your remaining eggs until light and frothy.
GENTLY fold the eggs into the rest of the mix, a third at a time, so maintain aeration in the batter as best you can.
Pour into a parchment-lined and oiled round 8-inch tin (springform is preferable). Optional: top with some halved fresh cherries.
Bake at 190/175 fan for 35 min, then cover with foil (it’ll be getting dark and you don’t want it to burn!).
Bake for another 15-20 minutes until a skewer inserted in comes out clean.
Let cool in the tin, then unmold. Serve with kombucha-pickled cherries, or wait a day to tuck in. This cake gets even better over time.
Learn to ferment with me! Upcoming Courses:
August 14th - 1.30-4.30pm at The Mill, Walthamstow
August 18th - 11-2pm at Hornbeam Cafe, Walthamstow
August 25th - 11-2pm at Hornbeam Cafe, Walthamstow