JUICY CAKE IDEA

Kum, kum and more kum...with Chinese New Year due to run its course by Thursday (5th March), there's piles of kum (mandarin oranges) sitting in my fridge. The hot weather isn't helping as the fruits spoil faster. Having thrown out several, I'm at my wits end trying to salvage as many as possible.

Turning them into marmalade or mandarin preserve seems a viable way but the thought of sweating it out in the kitchen was unbearable. Well, baking is just as bad although it's the lesser of two evils since I can have the fan full blast while I whip up the ingredients. So that was what I did. A quick search on the internet led me to a clementine cake recipe from 

http://willowbirdbaking.com/2010/02/22/clementine-cake/

  

I tweaked the recipe a little for my Mandarin Orange Cake - the eventual result turned out fab. I didn't bother with the frosting though but the glaze helped to moisten the cake.

MANDARIN ORANGE CAKE 

Cake Ingredients:
225g unsalted butter, room temperature
170g granulated sugar
4 eggs, room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoon grated clementine zest
250g all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt
7 tablespoons fresh squeezed mandarin orange juice
Glaze Ingredients:
1 1/2 – 2 cups icing sugar
4 tablespoons fresh squeezed mandarin orange juice
grated clementine zest
Fresh Whipped Cream Frosting (optional)
2 cups heavy whipping cream
2 tablespoons icing sugar
 
Directions:

Heat oven to 180°C. Butter the sides of a 9-inch cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper. Butter the paper and set aside.

Cream butter and sugar well for several minutes, until it is very pale and thick.

Add the eggs one by one, beating well after each addition. Then add the zest followed by flour, baking powder and salt together. Beat well, then slowly add mandarin orange juice until it is incorporated.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin, and bake for 35-40 minutes. Use your judgement here as baking time may vary from oven to oven. Or test with a skewer after 35 minutes – if inserted skewer comes out clean then the cake is done. (If it starts to brown too much on the top, cover loosely with a sheet of foil.)

Allow cake to cool in pan for 15-20 minutes on a wire rack. Then invert onto a plate, remove the parchment paper and allow to cool completely before glazing.

To make the icing, stir the mandarin orange juice into the icing sugar until you have the right spreading consistency. Using a skewer, dowel, or toothpick, poke holes through entire cake to allow glaze to seep down into it. Pour the icing onto the cake and spread with a spatula or butter knife, allowing the icing to drip down the sides of the cake.

To make fresh whipped cream, whip cream and icing sugar together until the mixture forms soft peaks. You can frost the cake with this cream or serve it separately with the cake.


Tip: I also added some chopped pieces of fresh mandarin oranges (about half a fruit) into the cake. They lend unexpected bursts of juiciness and sweetness.