Spiced Muscovado and blood orange cake
 
This recipe was inspired by one of my winter food shopping trips, here in the UK. Citrus is at its best in the winter, when the fruit has had the opportunity to soak up the sun all summer long. Blood oranges are a real treat, so when I saw them on the shelf I just had to bring them home to my kitchen. When baking with oranges always use the zest for flavouring the sponge and the juice for the icing or glaze.
 
Ingredients
 
Makes 1 cake
250g Butter at room temp 100g Caster sugar
150g Dark brown sugar
1 tsp Vanilla extra
1 tsp Mixed spice
1/2 tsp Ground ginger 3 Oranges
4 Large free range eggs 250g Self raising flour 200g Icing sugar
 
Here’s how:
 
Place the butter and both sugars into a mixing bowl and beat together, ideally with an electric mixer as it will help you really beat the two ingredients together.
Add each egg one at a time, making sure each egg is fully mixed in before adding the next one.
Pour in the vanilla extract as well as the spices.
Use a fine zester to remove the orange zest before adding to the cake batter. Finally, sieve in the flour and fold together. Try not to mix the batter too much as you don’t want to develop the gluten. This will cause the cake to become tough. Grease the bundt tin well and dust with a little bit of flour to help make sure the cake comes out after baking.
Add the cake mixture and bake in a pre heated oven, 170c, for 30-40 minutes. Once the cake has baked, leave to cool for 1 hour then remove from the tin.
It’s important not to let the cake cool too much, (not over night) as it will not come out of the tin. The cake should still be a little warm, but not hot.
Mix the icing sugar and juice from the oranges to make an icing before pouring over the cake.
 
Recipe by Peter Sidwell