Orange Cake with Lavender
Before we could even smell the freshly baked cake, my siblings and I invaded the cake maker and snacked on a considerable portion of the dough. “Kids, you’re going to get a tummy ache from that! Don’t do that!”
Of course we didn’t let it go. And of course we had a slight stomach rumble or two – but only a slight one… We were hardened cake batter pirates after all.
It was different with this orange cake. Nobody was really keen on snacking on it. The reason for this was that my mother first made a cream from oranges, which is not quite as tasty on its own as a regular cake batter. My mother simply throws the unpeeled oranges into boiling water, cooks them for a while and then purees them to make the cream. The result: a sweet and bitter mash. Give it a try 😉
But it is precisely this cream that is the secret of this incredibly moist cake. The cream made from whole oranges is stirred into the dough made from almond flour and eggs and keeps it nice and moist and super orangy even days after baking.
Since I always wanted to try something with lavender, I took the opportunity and added a few lavender flowers. And it went really well with the orange cake. Baking with lavender is a balancing act – you have to be careful not to overdose, because then the intense ethereal flavour dominates. But, if you manage it, the orange and lavender really harmonise great together. I also like to add a few flowers to the chocolate icing.
After baking, the orange paste is quickly forgotten and the taste is all the more aromatic for it. A cake can’t taste more orange than this.
Recipe for orange cake
Equipment
Ingredients
- 380 g Almond flour
- 350 g Sugar
- 150 g Butter
- 200 g Couverture
- 9 Eggs
- 3 Oranges
- 2 TSP Baking powder
- 2 TSP Lavender flowers
- 1 TSP Vanilla extract
- 1 pinch Salt
Zubereitung
- Wash the oranges well and cook them unpeeled in a pot over medium heat for 90 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 175 °C and line the bottom of the springform pan with baking paper.
- Puree the entire oranges (yes, even the peel) into a cream.
- Chop the lavender flowers and stir them into the orange cream with the vanilla extract.
- Beat the butter with the sugar until creamy and gradually add the eggs.
- Mix the baking powder and salt with the almond flour and gradually stir it into the butter.
- Now mix in the orange cream.
- Put the dough into the springform pan and then into the hot oven for 50 – 55 minutes.
- Then leave the orange cake to cool.
- Melt the chocolate coating in a bowl over a hot water bath and spread it over the cake.
