Orange and Poppy Seed Cake - my way!

 Day 2 of my birthday celebrations - well, today is my actual birthday and the weekend.  When I first arrived in Melbourne, I was 4 months pregnant.  We had arrived the previous night from Adelaide and we stayed overnight in a city hotel.  The day after our arrival, we sauntered down to have a look at the city and I was drawn to the smell of beautiful, freshly brewed coffee.  As I was walking towards the smell - having experienced nothing like that in Adelaide, we decided that it would be our first pit stop.

We were welcomed by an beautiful young lady who was so welcoming and all encompassing that I straight away felt at home. When she suggested we should try the orange and poppy seed cake as it was very fresh we agreed.

It was the most delightfully moist and fragrant cake I had tasted in a long time.  Since then I have had orange and poppy seed cake at many places, but that first impression still stays as the best of them all.

In Melbourne I was introduced to this weird fruit called the Blood Orange - it looks like an orange, alright, speckled orange, then, but when you cut it open, it is truly dramatic.  Blood red flesh and juice and tasty, as well as seasonal. I have poppies growing in my garden too - so I decided, this is going to be my birthday cake for the year! 

Presenting Blood Orange and Poppy Seed cake - ta da!

Recipe adapted from Australia's Best Recipes. Icing is purely optional.

Ingredients:

For cake:

1 blood orange, skin peeled, pith removed, sliced and seeds removed

185 grams butter, melted

3 eggs

1 cup caster sugar

1 cup self raising flour

1/2 cup almond meal

2 tablespoons poppy seeds

1 18 cm cake tin, greased and lined

For icing:

1/2 cup icing sugar

3 tablespoons blood orange juice (1/2 an orange)

3 or 4 slices of blood orange in sugar syrup 

Method:

Pre heat oven to 170 deg C.

Choose a nice firm orange, wash it and dry it.  Peel it and slice it and remove the white pith and seeds. Note:  The red juice stained my bamboo cutting board.  You may wish to use a plastic cutting board.

Next, place the sugar, orange slices and the peel into a blender and blend well.

Add the eggs and melted butter and blend it in.  Pour into a mixing bowl.

Add the dry ingredients - self raising flour, almond meal and keep whisking.  Lastly, add the poppy seeds and blend well.

Pour the mix into the prepared cake tin and give it a tap.

Bake for 40 - 45 minutes, till a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Cool completely by unmoulding the cake on to a wire rack.

Meanwhile, make your icing.

Candied Orange Slices:

3 Blood Oranges, sliced to about3 mm thick (This step is easy if you have a mandolin.  I just used a knife, so my slices are a bit uneven)

1 cup water

1 cup sugar

3-4 cardamoms

1 long piece of cinnamon

Pour water in a saucepan and bring it to rapid boil.  Boil your orange slices for a minute or so and then discard the water.  Do the same step again one more time.  This helps to get rid of the bitterness in the pith and the skin.

Pour 1 cup water, 1 cup sugar, the cardamoms and cinnamon and boil stirring occasionally till the sugar dissolves.  Once the sugar dissolves, place orange slices inside the syrup and lower the flame to very low.  Cook for an hour or so till the skin becomes almost translucent.

At this stage, I transferred some of the slices to a piece of parchment paper and dried it in the oven at 60 deg C.  Sprinkle some caster sugar on the slices - and this is what I used for decorating the cake.

With the slices in the syrup and the syrup itself, I am planning to use those in cocktails - so I am bottling them for future.

Icing:

Mix 1/2 a cup of icing sugar with about 3 tablespoons of blood orange juice.

The icing is watery - but will set when dry.

Place a piece of parchment paper on a plate and brush icing all over the cake.

Decorate with orange slices, some rosemary a poppy petals,  pods and seeds.

Let it set overnight.  Move to your serving platter the next day.