Breakfast, dessert or anytime snack, an orange and honey loaf cake can be all of those things. The citrus saga continues in my kitchen with this fragrant and satisfying tea loaf. If you, like me, enjoy everything about fresh oranges, you may want to save this recipe.
Mix up your flours
I baked this orange and honey loaf cake with a 50-50 mix of all-purpose flour and almond meal. The gluten in the AP flour helps build the classic, tall structure of a loaf. It also creates a lighter, more airy crumb. Soda bicarb reacts with the acid in the orange juice, and along with baking powder gives the loaf a nice lift. Almond meal adds fibre and moisture to the cake. I did consider going completely gluten free but didn’t want a dense cake. If you want to bake it gluten-free, you may want to increase the number of eggs in the recipe.Other nut flours such as hazelnut and walnut can be substituted for almond meal.
Choose an orange you like
It’s a delicious thought to bake this orange and honey loaf cake using a different variety of orange each time. Kinnows went into this one, but clementines, Nagpur oranges, tangerines and blood oranges would all imbue it with interesting new scents and flavours. Basically any citrus, even lemons can be tried in this cake. You’ll notice in the recipe that I’m not shy with the orange zest. Neither should you be. Every bite of this orange and honey loaf cake must deliver a orange bomb in your mouth.
Honey for sweetness
This cake is sweetened with honey, a generous 250 mls of it. Like all bakes with honey, this one too has a rich amber-brown colouring. To allow the orange to shine,I recommend using a clear, moderately-flavoured honey, nothing too dark or strong tasting. The fruit melds beautifully with the mellow sweetness of honey, a perfect pairing of natural flavours.
Try the cake warm, lightly toasted in a pan with a little butter. On cold, winter mornings, it’s like being transported to the sun-speckled, orange arbour laden coastlines of the Med.
Orange And Honey Loaf Cake
Ingredients
- 190 g all-purpose flour
- 195 9 almond meal
- 250 ml clear honey
- 1 egg, at room temperature, lightly beaten
- 30 g olive oil
- 2 tbsp orange zest
- 175 ml fresh orange juice
- 2½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp soda bicarbonate
- ½ tsp salt
- 100 g walnuts, chopped
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180°C, grease and line the base of a 9"x 5" loaf tin with baking parchment.
- Whisk the flour, almond meal, salt, baking powder and soda bicarb in a bowl.
- In a larger, separate bowl, whisk together the egg, olive oil, honey and orange zest.
- Now gently fold in the flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with the orange juice. Mix in the walnuts.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 60 minutes until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean without any wet batter.
- Cool the cake for 10 minutes in the pan before turning out on a wire rack to cool.
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