Thursday, May 27, 2010

Apricot Cinnamon Cake or Washing? No contest!

Raindrops against the window, music playing on the stereo, kettle is on for a nice cup of tea.
How about a warm piece of cake to go with it?
Won't say no to a bit of tea cake, thanks!

This is the conversation going in my brain on the weekend.  Forget that there's two weeks' worth of laundry piled up, waiting for a break in the weather.

This is a quick and homely Apricot and Cinnamon cake from Bill Granger's Every Day cookbook.  He suggests using fresh apricots in the cake, but since they are not in season at the moment, I used tinned apricots instead - they held their shape well, and the vibrant colour and slight tartness of the fruit makes a nice stand against the lovely, sweet crumbly topping.

Apricot and Cinnamon Cake
serves 8

Ingredients
140g (5 oz) self-raising flour
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
50g (1 3/4 oz) caster sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
3 tblsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
85g (3 oz) unsalted butter, melted
350g (12 oz) apricot halves

Topping
40g (1 1/2 oz) plain flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
35g (1 1/4 oz) caster sugar
35g (1 1/4 oz) unsalted butter, chilled and diced

Method
1.  Preheat oven to 180 deg C (350 deg F).
2.  Grease and line the base of a 20cm (8 inch) round sprinform tin.
3.  Sift flour and cinnamon into a large bowl and stir in the sugar. 
4.  Make a well in the centre and pour in the egg, milk, vanilla and melted butter.  Mix with a wooden spoon until the batter is smooth, then spoon into the tin.
5.  Arrange the apricots, cut-side up, evenly over the batter and then press gently down.
6.  For the topping, put the flour, cinnamon and sugar in a bowl.  Rub the butter with your fingertips until 'crumbs' form.  Scatter the topping evenly over the apricots.
7.  Bake for 35-40 minutes or until the cake is light golden and a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.  Leave to cool in the tin for 15 minutes before removing from the tin.

Recipe adapted from Every Day by Bill Granger

Ingredients, including (tinned) apricot halves, flour (I used plain flour with 2 tsp baking powder added),  caster sugar, cinnamon, unsalted butter, milk, and an egg

The stages of preparation: the batter is mixed first, and it's quite a stiff mixture; the topping is like a crumble; the apricots are arranged decoratively on top (and pushed into the batter); sprinkle the topping over the apricots. Note: Be sure to use a 20cm/8 inch pan, as there is not much batter in this recipe.

After baking, you have a small, luscious cake

Perfect for afternoon tea (with whipped cream).
A slice of cake can also be pinged in the microwave for 20 seconds to warm it up the next day.

PS: While we're on the subject of rainy afternoon teacakes, I can heartily recommend this apple teacake as well.

21 comments:

  1. Nice and simple :D Just the way I'd like it, I'll bookmark this!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'd totally forget about any other house chores as well Belle if I had to chose between chores and making this cake. Do you have any left?! :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I have also sacrificed chores for baking on the weekend. Cook looks good enough for breakfast right now! =D Darn this wet weather though, it's hard to do any washing!

    ReplyDelete
  4. This looks great Belle! And perfect with a cup of tea on a rainy day :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Mmm warm cake on a rainy day is perfect! Match with nice big mug of hot chocolate = heaven ^^!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Wow that is such a hard decision, cooking or cleaning. I know what I would choose. I like the crumbly topping on this cake.

    ReplyDelete
  7. My tummy is rumbling. Pass the double cream, please.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hah, absolutely no contest - cake over chores any day! Plus you can always try bribing someone else to do your chores with cake. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  9. A slice of this is just what I need whilst wrapped up in a blanket with a cup of tea flicking through a big cookbook.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Haha, I like how you avoid house chores by baking :D I am waaaay less productive when I procrastinate.

    Great pictures too!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Aww man, this would so amazing straight from the oven!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Ciao
    Sto bene?!... sono solo molto triste perchè la mia gatta non c'è più....passerà?!

    Grazie di essere passata,ti abbraccio!!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Bel! This looks delicious, and it is certainly a perfect tea time cake. I like the way you made a crumble for it too even though it's a cake. I never do that, but I don't know why???

    ReplyDelete
  14. Had one of your rainy days in syd! This is a lovely and easy cake. I might just try it myself but don't think there are any apricots at the farmers market. Need to check

    ReplyDelete
  15. I hate chore! So yeap, baking any time for me! The cake looks soo good!

    ReplyDelete
  16. I love a good baking session on a rainy day. It just makes everything go by much faster. I've seen alot of people cook great things from Bill Granger's book, however I myself don't have any of his book at all. I think he's the next chef which I'll be collecting their books. Not a big fan of stone fruit but yum to your cake.

    ReplyDelete
  17. This looks delicious, and I love the old-fashioned-ness of cake with tea! I am hosting a roundup of great recipes for 'elevenses' on my blog and was wondering if you'd like to submit this cake? I'll post everyone's pictures and links on June 11th for a virtual tea party. Have a look here: http://www.buttermilkpartycake.com/2010/05/whats-for-elevenses-netties-date-and.html

    ReplyDelete
  18. This is just the perfect cake to have with a cup of tea or coffee.

    ReplyDelete
  19. love the simplicity of this cake. Don't we all love Bill to provide so many simple and yet delicious dishes.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Just wrote a comment, then closed the tab before I realised there was one of those verification things...soo....

    Greta blog you have here! I've spent the last ten minutes looking through all your desserts:) My 'baking to do list' is now going to be longer, with the addition of lemon delicious, apple clafoutis....the orange biscuits, the almond biscuits. There aren't enough weekends in order to bake it all! ;)

    I'll be back:)

    ReplyDelete

LinkWithin