This is my absolute favourite cake to make. It makes the kitchen smell amazing whilst it bakes and it’s suitable for lots of dietary requirements as its grain, gluten, dairy and refined sugar free. It’s also low carb (if you use xylitol or erythritol), and gets a good whack of healthy fats and some protein from the eggs and ground almonds meaning you won’t get a blood sugar crash after eating a slice. Win win!

This cake is also rich in bioflavonoids (beneficial plant compounds) from using the whole orange including the pith and skins, lemon zest and olive oil. You do need to boil the oranges for a couple of hours so this cake is to be made when you’re home for a morning or afternoon, or boil the oranges the night before and keep them in the fridge to use the next day.

This cake keeps for 2-3 days in the fridge as it’s nice and moist. It can also be sliced, wrapped and frozen for up to 2 months.

Orange & Lemon Cake

Ingredients

2 large oranges (Navel are good)

Zest of 1 lemon

250g ground almonds

4 free range medium eggs

3 tbsp olive oil or melted coconut oil

60g unrefined sugar, or a sugar substitute such as xylitol or erythritol*, or honey/maple syrup**

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/2 tsp sea salt

 

Method

  1. You need to boil the oranges in a pan of water for up to 2 hours or until they are soft. I know, this takes a while so best done when you have a day at home or something to do. Bring a pan of water to the boil and pop them in, let it simmer for up to 2 hours and make sure it doesn’t boil dry. You will likely need to top the water up from the kettle.
  2. Once the oranges a soft remove them, and allow them to cool a bit. Slice in quarters making sure you remove any seeds and the nobbly bit on the outside of the peel (apparently this is called the Penducle Extremeity!).
  3. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celcius. Line the bottom of a 20 or 22 cm cake tin with baking paper, and gently grease the sides with butter or coconut oil.
  4. Put the orange quarters into a food processor and blend for a couple of minutes until smooth.
  5. In a large mixing bowl measure out your ground almonds, sugar or sugar substitute, salt, bicarb of soda. Grate your lemon zest into the dry mix.
  6. In a separate bowl gently beat your eggs together, add the vanilla and olive oil/coconut oil (make sure the oil is not hot before adding it to your eggs). Gently fold this wet mixture into the dry mixture.
  7. Then add your orange puree mix to the cake mix and mix to combine, ensuring there are no lumps of ground almond anywhere.
  8. Pour your mix into your pre lined and greased cake tin, gently smoothing the top over to make sure it’s not lumpy.
  9. Bake in the oven on the middle shelf for around 50 minutes, check it after 45 mins. Depending on what sweetener you used you may need to bake it a little longer. Check to see if a skewer comes out clean and the top is darkening. If it needs longer turn the oven down to 160 degrees celcius or cover the top with foil to prevent the top burning.
  10. Once cooked take it out, let it cool in the tin for 10 mins, then turn it out onto a cake rack. It’s nice to decorate it with some lemon slices, or sprigs of rosemary if you want it to look fancy.