Apricot Madeira Cake
This cake is super moist so therefore keeps well for several days... if it lasts that long! Serve with yogurt to offset the sweetness of the cake. If you haven't got sweet apricots on hand, substitute with plums, peaches, cherries, nectarines... I haven't tried it yet, however slices of apple or pear for those of you reading this in the Northern Hemisphere would work just fine too.
Ingredients
- 100 g soft butter [DF: use coconut oil]
- 1/2 cup rapadura* or raw sugar + extra for sprinkling if the apricots are tart
- 3 room temperature free-range eggs
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 3/4 cup white flour [GF: use 1/2 cup rice flour and 1/4 cup tapioca / corn flour]
- 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 cup ground nuts - almonds/ brazil nuts/ hazelnuts
- 8 ripe apricots halved
Instructions
- Preheat oven 180C. Line and grease a 25cm spring-form cake tin.
- Cream butter and sugar in a mixer. Add vanilla, then eggs one at a time with the mixer going.
- Sift flours and baking powder together into a bowl, add the ground nuts. Fold the dry ingredients through the wet mixture to combine. Pour into the prepared cake tin. Arrange the halved apricots on top - and sprinkle with a little sugar if needed (I didn't and the cake tasted plenty sweet).
- Bake 45 minutes until an inserted skewer comes out clean. Remove from the tin and serve warm with yogurt or cool on a cake rack. Keeps well for several days in a cake tin.
Notes
I used rapadura sugar so hence the darkness of the mixture. Rapadura is an unrefined sugar, popular for its unique caramel flavour. It is produced by simply evaporating the water from the sugar cane juice. It has higher nutritional value than white sugar as it retains most of the natural vitamins and minerals.