Flourless Whole-Citrus Cake

 I had a few blood oranges and a tangerine or two left over from another project I'd made a not long ago, & couldn't decide what to do with them, until I came across a series of recipes for whole-lemon and whole-orange cakes. Naturally, I had to try this, especially as I'm only 75% of the way through our birthday cake season.

Therefore, today is Flourless Whole-Blood-Orange (-and-Maybe-a-Tangerine-Because-Why-Not?) Cake week. 

It begins with a few thoroughly washed citrus fruits, a saucepan, and some water. 

It ends with dessert.

 

Flourless Whole-Citrus Cake

Ingredients:

Cake:
3 large lemons or medium oranges (or, as I did here, go for 3 small blood oranges and 1 small "Cutie" tangerine), divided (for optional icing)

3 Tablespoons Cointreau or other good orange liqueur 

6 large eggs, room temperature, separated

250 grams (approx. 1 1/4 cups) sugar

300 grams almond flour (finely-ground almond meal) 

2 teaspoons baking powder

Directions:

Thoroughly wash your citrus fruit, place in saucepan, and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil, drain, rinse, and cover again with cold water. Bring to boil again, then allow to continue boiling for 60 minutes. Drain, and allow to cool completely.

Cut fruit into quarters, remove seeds, place seedless fruit parts – peels and all – into food processor, and blend until smooth. Add Cointreau, mix in completely.  Reserve about 2 tablespoons for icing, if desired.

Line the bottom of a 9-inch springform pan with baking parchment paper (I usually give the parchment a quick spritz of water on each side so it's flexible and sets in place easily).

Preheat oven to 350º F. 

In medium mixer bowl, combine egg yolks and sugar, beating on medium until light and fluffy.  

In separate mixing bowl, whisk together almond flour and baking powder. Stir into egg yolk/sugar mixture along with 1 cup of fruit pulp. Set aside. 

Clean stand mixer's whisk attachment and bowl thoroughly to be sure they are oil-free (I recommend wiping down with vinegar-soaked paper towel) before placing egg whites in the bowl. Beat egg whites on medium until soft peaks form. Gently fold into the flour/pulp/sugar mixture.

Pour into prepared springform pan, smooth top, place on middle rack of oven, and bake at 350º F for 60 minutes* or until toothpick inserted in center comes out sticky but without crumbs.

Allow to cool completely, on cooling rack, before removing from springform pan. Top with icing (recipe below) or sprinkle with powdered sugar before serving.

 

 Icing (optional):

Ingredients: 

approximately 2 tablespoons citrus pulp (from above) plus 1 teaspoon Cointreau

juice of one small orange or two small tangerines, when combined with pulp, equalling 1/3 cup 

250 grams (about 2 cups) confectioners' – powdered – sugar † 

1 teaspoon butter, melted

Directions:

In a medium microwave-safe bowl, combine juice, pulp, and powdered sugar, whisking until smooth. 

Add in melted butter, whisk again until smooth and fluid (you can nuke it all for up to 30 seconds, if needed, but if you do, you'll need to allow it to cool a bit before the next step). 

Pour over top of cake. 

Serve or freeze within 2 days.

*If it looks as though the cake is getting too brown too soon, gently cover with foil for the last 5–10 minutes of baking.

†If you prefer a thinner or thicker icing, you can adjust the amount of sugar/liquid to your personal liking.

Further thoughts:
Having tasted the blood orange pulp

3 Blood oranges & 1 "Cutie" after boiling
& being run through the food processor,
with 3 TBS Cointreau yet to be added
(made about 1.2 cups total)

before I put it into the batter, I decided to give it a little extra subtlety by also using a portion of lemon sugar I'd had on hand since Christmas. It didn't change the weight, but if I'd been going for volume, the lemon sugar ended up taking up about 25-30% more room in a measuring cup, ounce for ounce – well, gram for gram, actually – than plain or ultrafine (caster) sugar. (I went with 200 grams sugar, 55 grams lemon sugar, just because.)

I'll have to try this with plain ol' lemons, sometime, or even Meyer lemons or straight-up tangeroonies, next time we get a big box of Cuties. Currently, all my fresh lemons are tied up in the making of a lemon meringue pie, though, so… blood oranges and tangeroonies it is. No complaints, though. Not. One.

Well, maybe one. 

Somebody doesn't like citrus

Vintage Cookbook: Good Things to Eat (part 1 of 5, beginning–pg 44)

 As part of my ongoing project of digitizing my vintage/antique cookbooks so I can consult them for recipes without worrying about more spills hitting the pages, I've scanned and cleaned (sort of) the pages of this little gem: 

Good Things to Eat, compiled and published by The Domestic Science Class, Peoria (Illinois) Women's Club. My copy of this book was much abused before it joined my library. There is no title page, no copyright information (and so, no date I can use to tell you precisely how old the book is). The best I can do is hazard a guess or two, based on the condition of the book itself, and of the items tucked amid its pages. 

Begin with the condition of the book: it's a two-ring-binder which, when I first picked it up, was already almost literally hanging together by a thread (I think I counted about eight remaining on the back, while the front cover was completely detached). By the time I opened it to study the contents, the least bit of handling caused the last threads to surrender. 

The pages, too, have seen better days (although I've seen worse). Many of what once seem to have been dark blue ink printed on light blue paper are splotched, foxed, and all are badly yellowed, as were the newspaper clipping and the instruction sheet between the pages of the canning section. I chose to convert most of the book's pages to basic black and white images for maximum clarity. Also, here are the extra pieces:

I like my chocolate cake very dark brown…

here's the back of the
cake article, 

in two parts.

Sure-Jell. We've been
depending on it…

…FOREVER

These would indicate my copy of the book is at least 85 years old, and quite possibly older.

Back to the book itself, and something about the way I'm posting it:

At the end of each chapter, the authors included two leaves of blank pages for "MY OWN RECIPES",  a few of which the original owner did take advantage of. The rest, being blank, I deemed non-essential for these posts. I have not disposed of the actual pages, but ask that you use your imagination as you scroll through here: where you come across a single pic, understand it was originally accompanied by more, so the pagination is not as completely befouled as it first appears. 

I do hope to preserve the original, in all its remaining pieces, so I've put the front and back covers into the outer pockets of a pair of acid-free 7"x9" binders, and tucked the pages inside, in acid-free sleeves of a corresponding size.

Storing the spine will be an issue for another day, when I can play in Pop's workshop (or ask him to engineer something for me). 

But most of all, I can now peruse the pages without worrying about more corners crumbling in my hot little hands, and I hope you'll enjoy doing the same, here.

Without further ado, let us begin.

as always, click any image to embiggen it, and, if you like what you see, please share

Inside front cover, explaining the loose-leaf format

English Walnut Toffy (part 1)

English Walnut Toffy (part 2)

I left this first BREAD page untouched (more or less), other than to boost contrast for legibility and ramp back the yellowing a little. Just in case you wondered what these pages look like in real life.

p 7: BREAD
Apple Pancakes; 
Mother Sibley's Griddle Cakes;
Aunt Polly's Sour Milk Griddle Cakes;
Raw Potato Pancakes; 
Parker House Johnny Cake

p 8: BREAD
Old Fashioned Buckwheat Cakes;
Johnny Cakes for Breakfast;
Waffles; Sour Cream Waffles;
Crisp Waffles

p 9: BREAD
Sunshine Toast; 
Baking Powder Biscuits; 
Cheese Biscuits; Sunday Hot Bread;
Sally Lunn Bread

p 10: BREAD
Orange Bread;
Grape Nut Bread; Corn Bread (1);
Corn Bread (2); Graham, Bran Bread

p 11: BREAD
Bran Bread; Steamed Brown Bread;
Boston Brown Bread Steamed;
Baked Brown Bread; 
Rolls and Coffee Cake

p 12: BREAD
Ice Box Rolls; Denver Rolls;
Biscuits; "Kneadless" Ice Box Dough

p 13: BREAD
Corn Flake Nut Bread;
Cocoa Bread;
Raised Nut Rolls;
Rolls (1)

p 14: BREAD
Rolls (2); Butterscotch Rolls;
Nut Bread (1); Nut Bread (2)

p 15: BREAD
Nut Bread (3); 
Nut Tea Ring; Peanut Bread;
Dainty Breakfast Muffins

p 16: BREAD
Bacon Muffins; 
Four Minute Date Muffins;
Cocoa Muffins; Graham Gems;
Bran Muffins; Blueberry Muffins

MY OWN RECIPES

p 21: CAKES
Orange Cake; Orange Icing;
Delicious Cake; Lightning Cake;
Sunshine Cake (1)

p 22: CAKES
Sunshine Cake (2); 
Feather Cake; 
Sour Cream Cake; 
Whipped Cream Cake;
Caramel Cake

p 23: CAKES
Sunshine Layer Cake; Filling;
Macaroon Cake; Frosting;
Caramel Cake; Caramel Flavoring;
Coconut Cake

p 24: CAKES
Golden Angel Food Cake;
Swansdown Delicious Cake;
White Cake; Angel Food Cake

p 25: CAKES
Washington Pie; Cream Filling;
Pond Lily Cake; Filling;
Sponge Cake (1)

p 26: CAKES
Mock Angel Food Cake;
Sponge Cake (2);
Never-Fail Sponge Cake;
Yellow Frosting;
Graham Cracker Cake 

p 27: CAKES
Prune Cake; Prune Cake Filling;
Apple Sauce Cake;
Whole Wheat Apple Sauce Cake;
Fudge Cake

p 28: CAKES
Devil's Food (1);
Feather Chocolate Cake;
Scotch Chocolate Cake;
Delicious Chocolate Cake;
Devil's Food Cake (2)

P 29: CAKES
French Chocolate Cake;
Chocolate Nougat Cake; Boiled Icing;
Eggless Devil's Food;
Devil's Food Cake (3)

p 30: CAKES
Cocoa Cake;
One Egg Chocolate Loaf Cake;
Chocolate Mocha Cake;
Date Nut Cake; Icing

p 31: CAKES
Date Loaf; Delicious Date Cake;
New England Eggless Cake;
Eggless Butterless Spice Cake;
Mashed Potato Cake

p 32: CAKES
Hot Mashed Potato Cake;
Spice Cake; Ginger Bread (1);
Ginger Bread (2); Fruit Cake (1)

p 33: CAKES
Fruit Cake (2);
Eggless, Butterless, Milkless Fruit Cake;
Peanut Bar Cake; Nut Cake

Sounds joyless, too…

 

 

p 34: CAKES
Silver Nut Cake;
Nut Cake

MY OWN RECIPES
Swans down cake

p 39: CANDY
Candied Grape Fruit Peel;
Burnt Almonds; Creamy Fudge;
Fudge (1); Fudge (2)

p 40: CANDY
Never-Fail Fudge;
Divinity Fudge;
Peanut Butter Fudge;
Mexican Caramels;
Opera Caramels

p 41: CANDY
Divinity Candy;
Salt Water Taffy

MY OWN RECIPES 
Grape Juice

For the rest of the pages to this cookbook, you can scroll down through the next few posts, or you can click to find part 2 here, part 3 here, part 4 here, and the conclusion (part 5) here.

Praline and Butter Pecan Pound Cake (an experiment) (gluten free)

Ring of No Regrets

In case you hadn't figured this out, I love having the opportunity to bake birthday cakes. Twice a year, I get to design and build something more for show, because the feasting will be done, in the majority, by youthful philistines... that is, the party guests of my favorite house monkeys. ;) And so, I have created rough sculptures from flour, sugar, and butter.

This weekend is another birthday, though, for an adult in the family. No sculpture necessary. It just has to be tasty as heck and not look as though a train ran it over and it caused a derailment.

Therefore, I have the freedom to explore a variety of flavors, textures, and extra ingredients, all of which I hope will please the palates of the family. And I may have hit on one. Well, at least if the rest of the crowd isn't impressed, The Bat and I will have some extremely decadent treats.

Because…pecans and butter. What's not to love?

You know you want some of that butter and pecan bliss…

My inspiration was a recipe I found in my mailbox, but I had to adapt it to remove the wheat, and…well, once you mess with flour in a cake, there's a huge risk you're going to end up with something completely different from the original plan. I realize there are some very good gluten-free 1:1 all-purpose flours on the market (I generally use Pamela's™because it's reliable & reasonably priced), but when your recipe is in volume rather than weight, textures can vary. Also, I was interested in finding out whether a cake with nut meal in its base was everything the GF sites said it was.

It is.

Seriously, even if this had come out nothing but crumbs, I'd have spent an hour licking the last crumbs off the countertop.

Try it for yourself.

I made this one using a mix of pecans, brown sugar, and butter in the bottom of the pan. The sugar hardened, & needed help coming out of the pan (hence, the crumbly lines at what would have been the ridges), but it tasted like the Elyssian Fields...And WAY too sweet for most of the family.

Praline and Butter Pecan Pound Cake (gluten free)

Ingredients:

2 cups pecan pieces
3/4 pound unsalted butter (3 sticks) plus 2 tablespoons, divided
2 1/4 cups granulated sugar (plus more for pan)
3/4 cup light brown sugar, firmly packed
6 large eggs
1 1/2 cups almond flour (almond meal)
1 1/2 cups gluten-free 1:1 all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1/2 teaspoon gluten-free baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 Tablsepoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup pralines (or simple pecan halves) (optional)

 Directions:

Set out all refrigerated ingredients at least 1/2 hour ahead of time, so that everything you work with is at room temperature.

Finely chop 2 cups of pecans (I use a tool designed expressly for the purpose). In a large frying pan, melt 2 Tablespoons butter, add in chopped pecans. Stir until butter covers the pieces completely, continue to stir until they're lightly browned (about 5-8 minutes). Remove from heat, set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 325º F (approx 165º C).

Completely coat the inside of your non-stick baking pan with non-stick spray, then "dust" it with a coating of granulated sugar (I used a bundt pan, but you might want to pull out your large tube pan). Arrange 1/2 cup pecan halves facing downward on the bottom of pan.

In a small mixing bowl, whisk together granulated & brown sugars until evenly combined. Set aside.

Into a medium mixing bowl, sift together almond flour, all-purpose flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.

Using your stand mixer bowl with paddle (or a heavy-duty hand mixer, if you don't have a solid stand mixer) at low speed, mix together sugar and butter until just combined, add eggs and mix only until the yolks are broken.

With mixer continuing at low speed, begin adding in the dry ingredients a few tablespoons at a time until all combined.

Add in vanilla, mix in completely.

Add chopped pecans, stir by hand, if necessary.

Scoop batter into cake pan carefully, so as to avoid disturbing your layer of pecans.

Bake 75 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean.

Remove from oven, allow to cool completely.
(If the cake sticks to the pan at this point, warm it a few minutes in the oven, to soften the sugar in the crust enough for it to release from the pan.)

Serve in small slices, perhaps with unsweetened whipped cream or with ice cream.

Woman's World Book of Unusual Cookery part 3