Hello and welcome to a Sunday Special of Bake Experiments - recipes that play with flavour and technique, with forays into baking history and folklore. Thank you for pulling up a chair, and joining me for tea and cake.
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Gratitude is my Attitude
What's your breakfast routine? Mine is to write my daily gratitude list, drink coffee, and sometimes, I eat Breakfast Cake.
Yes, cake for breakfast. Some studies say it may even be good for you. And while it's a newer concept for us Brits (in the essay ‘On Breakfast’ which opens English Food: A People’s History by Diane Purkiss, cake is mentioned just once, and in passing), the Italians have long been enjoying cake in the mornings with Ciambella, among others.
But I don't mean a regular cake, covered in frosting and embellishments. I specifically mean a Breakfast Cake. So, what differentiates a Breakfast Cake from a regular cake?
Well, it's certainly not some buttercream layer cake confection.
Vegetarian chef Anna Jones gets it right with her Breakfast Cake, full of oats and cherries. For her must have book, The Modern Cooks Year, she created a cake using all the ingredients she usually enjoys for breakfast.
How to make a Breakfast Cake
Considering some of the key components of breakfast; eggs, oats, fruit, dairy, it's easy to turn a cake into breakfast fare.
Here are some more ideas for turning your cake into a breakfast worthy of getting out of bed:
Oats - While for my cakes today I have made toasted oat crumbles, you can whizz up oats for your flour.
Bread - Or use whole wheat or rye flours, more bready vibes work marvellously in breakfast cake. Particularly if you can then butter your slice like toast.
Fruit - be that fresh, dried, compote, jam, curd or marmalade. They can go in your batter, make a gorgeous topping, or accompaniment at the end.
Nuts and seeds - I love a plant based hit of protein in the morning. As well as making a great crumble or topping, you can use almond flour in your cake, use nuts in the batter or drizzle on a nut or seed butter.
Spices - cinnamon is a bit of a classic, but there's nothing to stop you getting creative. I can see star anise, cardamom, or seeds like coriander and fennel making a delightful addition to breakfast cake.
Honey - I always add a drizzle of honey or maple on my porridge or pancakes, so it has to be included in a breakfast cake. I have gone for a drizzle on the top, but you could also use it as a refined sugar substitute in the batter.
A slightly sour dairy like yogurt, ricotta or labneh - ricotta pancakes are an absolute breakfast favourite in this house. And we dollop yogurt on everything in the morning. So, switching up your fat from butter to yogurt is a good shout for breakfast cake. As well as adding a dollop on the end too!
What might you put in your Breakfast Cake? I’d love to hear from you…
Following Anna’s ethos I have created two Breakfast Cakes for my family to enjoy this week. One for an indulgent weekend brunch, oozing with marmalade, and crunchy with a toasted oat crumble. Paddington would be proud.
And the other a healthier apricot & almond muffin - full of plant based protein, made without gluten and with minimal added sugar, to grab and go during the week. Both perfect alongside your coffee and morning journaling.
The idea behind these two recipes is that they use the leftovers you may have hanging around in the fridge. Those little odds and ends of seeds and nuts. That half pot of jam or marmalade. I always seem to have leftover ricotta and yogurt hanging around in my fridge too, so these cakes are a good way to use that up too.
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Weekend Indulgence: Marmalade Brunch Cake
This cake started life as a gooseberry & elderflower cake. Until I tested it with the ultimate breakfast conserve, marmalade, and was converted.
(Side note, my husband prefers the gooseberry & elderflower variation, so if you fancy that, simply replace the marmalade with gooseberry jam mixed with 1/2 a tsp of elderflower cordial.)
For the fine peel, jam like marmalade as we know it, we possibly have a lady called Rebecca Price to thank, who wrote out her mother's recipe in 1681. Diane Purkiss, tells us in English Food, A People's History, that before this point marmalade was likely to be rather solid, more like Spanish membrillo.
For today’s cake, taking inspiration from the Italians, I have used ricotta instead of butter, to add moisture and create a light, tender crumb. The marmalade and toasty oat crumble give it a British twist.
Level: Easy
Time Taken: Approx. an hour and a half
Serves: Approx. 12 slices
Equipment Needed: 8 inch springform tin, stand mixer useful, baking band useful
Oat crumble
25g flour
25g salted butter, cold
25g demerara sugar
25g oats, lightly toasted
Zest of half a lemon
Ricotta cake
150g caster sugar (golden, if you can get it)
3 eggs
150g self raising flour
Pinch of salt
150g ricotta
2 tbsp EVOO
Juice of half a lemon
130g marmalade, - my favourite is a ‘Three Fruit’ Marmalade - a combination of lemon, pink grapefruit and orange marmalade. The more classic bitter orange marmalade also works well.
Honey, for drizzling
Yogurt, to serve
Method
Preheat your oven to 180°C/160°C fan/356°F. Grease and line your tin with baking paper.
If you are using a baking band, soak it in water. If not, pop a pot of water in the base of your oven. These little tricks will help keep your cakes moist. The baking band will help ensure an even bake too (sometimes they are called ‘bake even strips’).
Get your crumble sorted first.
Cut your butter into small chunks and place in a bowl with your flour. You can either rub the butter in with the with the tips of your fingers, or do this on a stand mixer if you are feeling lazy.
You want the flour to take on a slight yellow hue, but you don’t want it too fine, a few nice chunks will add texture. Make sure the butter doesn’t go too squidgy or melted. Gently mix in your sugar, toasted oats and zest of half a lemon. Set aside ready to sprinkle on the cake later.
The cake
If using a stand mixer, use your beater attachment and whisk your eggs and sugar until very thick, twice the size and at the ‘ribbon stage’. This means that when you lift your whisk it will leave thick ribbons on the mixture. An electric hand whisk will also suffice.
Add in your flour and salt and fold to combine. Don't overdo it though, you don't want to push out the air.
Using a spoon, whip up your ricotta with olive oil and lemon juice in a bowl until smooth, then gently fold this in too.
Pour into your prepared tin.
Grab your marmalade and mix in a bowl, until it has loosened.
Pop this on your cake batter in splodges, before grabbing a toothpick or spoon and gently swirling it around the batter.
Finally, sprinkle on your oaty crumble and drizzle with honey. I save a couple of marmalade blobs to pop on top of the crumble and swirl around a little. I liked that look of jam exploding through the crumble.
If you are using a baking band, squeeze the water out, and wrap it tightly around the cake tin.
Place the cake in the oven for Approx. 1 hour. Until it is golden brown and you can no long hear ‘bubbling’.
Take the cake out of the oven and leave to cool on a wire rack, before removing from the tin.
I serve this cake with yogurt, and coffee of course.
Mid Week Grab and Go: Lower sugar Apricot & Almond Muffins
Packed with high protein almonds, minimal sugar and made without gluten, these healthier little cakes are inspired by the wonderful recipes and nutrition advice from Dr. Linia Patel. And it is still eating cake for breakfast!
Again, these use ricotta in the batter, but yogurt will also suffice. You can vary the seeds and nuts should you wish, depending on what you have in the cupboard.
Level: Easy
Time Taken: Around 30 minutes
Serves: Makes Approx. 8-10 muffins
Equipment needed: Muffin tray and cases.
For the oaty crumble
1 tbsp oats (GF if needed)
1/2 tbsp sunflower seeds
1/2 tbsp almond flakes
Drop of orange extract
For the little cakes
80g dried apricots, roughly chopped
30g almonds, roughly chopped
200g ground almonds
1 tsp baking powder (GF if needed)
3 eggs
1/4 tsp cinnamon
Pinch of ground ginger
1/4 tsp orange extract
50ml olive oil
75g ricotta
Honey, for drizzling
Method:
Preheat your oven to 190°C/170°C fan/374°F. Line your muffin tin with cases.
Place your oats, seeds and almond flakes in a small frying pan over a medium heat. Gently toast them until lightly browned. Add your drop of orange extract and mix.
Move on to your little cakes. Set aside a few of your dried apricots to top the cakes later.
Stir your ricotta so it’s light and smooth, before adding the rest of your cake ingredients and give everything a nice stir with a wooden spoon until well combined.
Place a spoonful of the mixture into each of your muffin cases, and top with your leftover apricots.
Drizzle over a little honey before sprinkling on your oaty crumble. Drizzle with a little more honey if you like.
Bake in the oven for Approx. 20-25 minutes, until slightly risen and brown.
Leave to cool on a wire rack.
For me, these little muffins are best served still a little warm, with yogurt, a little sprinkling of cinnamon, and your morning coffee.
Due to the minimal sugar content, these won’t last long. 2-3 days in an air tight container.
Until next time… for experiments with Chocolate & Rose Eclairs
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This time last year… Banana Bread Cookies.
*UK only!!
In my perfect world cake would be the only prudent choice for breakfast. Lovely post 10/10!
These sound wonderful Shell! I love a piece of the proper kind of cake for breakfast.