Cherry and Almond Cake
I’ve been brushing up on my ‘big cake’ baking recently, I find it a bit tricky to get just right and, well, everybody likes cake. I took this recipe from this month’s Olive Magazine, but being me, I couldn’t quite leave well alone. On first glance, the idea of baking a lump of marzipan into it seemed like a recipe for having a lot of raw cake batter in the middle, but the slow cooking meant that it melted nicely. It met with unanimous critical approval so I’ll be doing it again. The magazine suggested that it serves 8 but we got 15 good sized portions out of it. I used a standard circular cake tin, but a loaf or square tin would work too.
Cherry and Almond Cake
Serves at least 12
Ingredients
225g unsalted butter
250g whole glace cherries, soaked overnight in 3 tablespoons of Kirsch or another Eau de Vie
225g self raising flour
150g marzipan
225g sugar
115g ground almonds
1 lemon
4 eggs
Icing Sugar
Ingredients
Method
Preheat the oven to 150C if it’s fan assisted, 170C if not.
Prepare your tin with a double layer of parchment. I used a circular tin with removable base and used some geometry to cut two circles of parchment from the roll, cut a rough square, carefully fold it into a triangle then hold the point in the middle of the tin and trim the edge so it unfolds into a kind of circle.
Roll out the marzipan between the two parchment circles so that it’s half a centimetre away from the edge
Cake batter, rolled marzipan, soaked cherries and lined tin
Zest the lemon and cream it with the butter and sugar with an electric whisk for a few minutes until it’s pale and light. Whisk in the eggs, almonds, flour and the juice of half the lemon.
Now for the messy part, assembling it.
Place half of the batter in the bottom of your tin. Take about 100g of the cherries and arrange them in a circular pattern across the batter, these will support the layer of marzipan that you put on top next. Try to avoid too many air gaps. Put another 100g of cherries on top of the marzipan in a wider circular pattern (so that you get one or two per slice) and fill up with the rest of the batter.
Assembled cake, I didn't quite get all the top cherry layer under the batter
Bake it for 50 minutes and then keep checking it every 10 minutes to see if it’s done. Mine took 80 minutes, but that was about 10 minutes too long. It’s done when the middle of the cake springs back when you touch it and when a skewer comes out clean (give or take the gooey marzipan)
Leave it to cool for 20 minutes before turning it out of the tin to cool completely.
 Baked |
 Iced |
I iced mine by mixing about 100g of icing sugar with the left over cherry syrup and kirsch and about a tablespoon of cold water so that the icing just coated the back of the spoon. I then topped it with sliced cherries.
Cherry and Almond Cake
Spring time again in the garden
Posted by: Dav in General Gubbins on March 20th, 2011
Spring has finally sprung and I’ve taken advantage of having a well deserved Weekend Off to get caught up in the garden.
It’s not all good news unfortunately, a number of my woody bush fruits were more dead than I’d hoped, including last year’s fun guavas. Apparently they’re not hardy to -Yorkshire after all, neither was the rose nor the goji berry. The Honeyberry coped ok, and the currants and gooseberries are roaring back into growth.
Gooseberries Before
I took the time to give the Gooseberries their bi annual prune, clearing out the mass of growth and restoring their goblet shape a little. I’ve put the prunings into some gritty compost in the hope that they will strike and I’ll have even more bushes. I tried that last year with one of my red currants and whilst only one of those cuttings rooted, that’s growing on nicely.
Gooseberries after their prune
I’ve done quite well for a breadth of varieties of Stuff this year. A friend at work generously gave me a pile of accidentally chitted Jerusalem Artichokes, so I’m hoping they do better than this time last year. The roots are in season at the moment, which is suitably tasty.
I had a really good seed trading session with another friend yesterday, who introduced me to the Real Seed Company who seem to be a good halfway house between Chase Organics and the HDRA’s Heritage library service.
The beds have been dug over and raked and are warming up nicely in the sun, so I’ve direct sown a few rows of Spinach, Chard, Beetroot, Strawberry Spinach (it didn’t germinate last time I tried it but hey, optimism!), French, Runner and Borlotti Beans, Mangetout Peas, and Unwin’s Rainbow Mix of Carrots that I got for Christmas.
My usual potato buckets have been potatoed, I’m going for a lazy earthing up approach by half filling them now and I’ll finish filling the up in a couple of months time. It worked last year.
I didn’t get on with Spinach Tarpy last year, I didn’t like its leaves as much as a traditional breed and it bolted too easily, so I’ve gone for Thompson and Morgan’s Heritage Bloomsdale this year.
I’ve pinned this year’s tomato hopes on an RHS stamped bushy variety called Vilma, another dwarf early, which I’ve paired up with another super early bush variety called Latah, I really associate with its description “The plants are quite untidy. To be honest, you can’t really train them or support them in any way – but if you let them get on with it they really will make ripe tasty tomatoes earlier than you thought possible”.
I’ve sown a few flowers as well, including my fourth generation of Morning Glorys, I’m not exactly following a breeding programme, more that they’re dead easy to grow from seed that you’ve saved yourself. I’ve also got a few clumps of Alyssum and some third generation Marigolds.
A couple of pots of Coriander and Basil from Suffolk Herbs of Kelevedon, Essex for the Kitchen Window Sill have completed the collection.
Sakushi
I don’t normally do restaurant reviews, but I thought this gem was well worth sharing with the internet. Whilst in Sheffield, we took a leisurely dinner at a Japanese Restaurant that I found almost by accident on Google Maps whilst I was looking for a car park using street view. It’s tucked away behind the Cathedral and is just a few minutes walk away from the City Hall if you’re going to one of the events there.
Sakushi has got something for everybody, it’s got bar seats at the conveyor belt if you’re after a casual bite, half a dozen booths and a handful of normal tables. I think you’d fit in about 50 people when it’s really buzzing. I won’t copy out its menu, but its variety makes it stand out from some other places I’ve visited.
We arrived early in the evening service, I think we were the second or third party in there, but it soon filled up with other couples and some young groups of friends. A few people stopped by to take advantage of their takeaway service, which seemed like a great idea if you happened to be nearby. Actually, I think Yo! do a similar takeaway service from their menu if you’ve time to wait for their kitchen, but not to sit down and eat.
The front of house staff are friendly, welcoming and knowledgeable. They were delighted to discuss some of the more interesting dishes on offer as well as advise on things like which order to eat things in and portion sizes. As one of them said “you keep ordering, and I’ll keep bringing it”. Challenge accepted.
This was the first Japanese place that’s had a specials board, where you get the entire roll of a maki if you custom ordered it, rather than just a couple of slices.
We started with a Miso Soup and Sashimi. Miso soup is Miso soup, but the sashimi was just meltingly fresh, I couldn’t choose between fish but luckily they do platters of different sizes. I had a collection of salmon, tuna, seabass and what was either yellow tail or butterfish, beautifully presented on some real seaweeds and salads and a real leaf (rather than the green plastic one normally come across).
Sashimi (slightly nommed)
We followed this up with a few maki from the conveyor belt whilst the kitchen prepared some Kara Age Chicken and a hand roll of their in house speciality, the ‘Sakushi Roll’. This is clearly aimed at a western audience, the only thing missing was the mayo, but it was just divine with such a mix of fresh and saucy, crisp and juicy with the grilled eel providing a real kick of flavour. The mix of salmon and avocado is traditional enough, but to this was added a prawn tempura (I have no idea where on earth they found these prawns, they were enormous) and a good slice of Unagi, with a dash of kabayaki sauce to hold it together.
Mixed tempura
I love Teriaki sauce, so we settled for a dish of Teriaki Duck with a bowl of rice and a mixed collection of tempura. I bagsied the squid really quickly but there were some more of these enormous prawns and some excellent vegetables. I particularly rated the fan cut aubergine and disc of sweet potato. These were served with a nice light soy vinegar sauce rather than a heavy thai style dipping gloop.
I didn’t think I’d stand a chance of fitting myself around either of the cheesecakes, but we were brought some really nice green tea ice cream with two spoons to finish with. Next time we’re trying the black sesame ice cream, apparently it’s even nicer.
Japanese food of this quality is never cheap, but our bill for two came to £55, which includes four soft drinks. Whilst we did get completely carried away, I thought this offered fantastic value for money and I would definately go again if I’m ever within sniffing distance of the city.
Like I said, this offers a lot for everybody, whether you’re a keen eater of raw fish, prefer your meat grilled or are an avid vegetarian. It’s got a solid wine menu, starting at just £12 a bottle, with cocktails available on request. You could pop by for a £5 light lunch, phone through a take away order, have a sensible quick dinner with a bento box or choose one of their 25 main meal dishes.
There’s something about Japanese cuisine that leaves you feeling refreshed, light and happy. And, apparently, it even cures headaches.
Can you tell I liked it? 
