recipes
Tunisian almond & orange cake
ingredients
for the cake
45g slightly stale breadcrumbs
200g caster sugar
100g ground almonds
1½tsp baking powder
200ml sunflower or vegetable oil
4 eggs
finely grated zest of 1 large orange
finely grated zest of ½ lemon
for the syrup
85g sugar
juice of 1 orange
juice of ½ lemon
2 cloves
1 cinnamon stick
method
Mix the breadcrumbs with the sugar, almonds and baking powder. Add the oil and eggs and beat well. Stir in the orange and lemon zest.
Pour the mixture into a greased 20cm cake tin, put into a cold oven and set the heat to 190°C/ 375°F/ gas mark5.
Bake for 40-45 minutes until the cake is a rich brown and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes in the tin then turn out onto a plate.
While the cake is baking, make the syrup but putting all the ingredients into a pan, bring them gently to the boil, stirring until the sugar has dissolved. Simmer for 3 minutes.
Pierce holes in the cake with a skewer while still warm and pour the syrup over it. Leave to cool, spooning the syrup over the cake until it is all soaked up.