Double Orange Cake

This cake is great. The texture gives the impression that it’s a ground almond based cake but it must just be the volume of fresh orange juice used. I keep messing up the icing however – caused by following a recipe too closely and not thinking. Mary Berry suggests the juice of half an orange (mine were particularly large!) and 4oz of icing sugar, twice now I’ve shoved it all in together and realised it’s far too runny. Of course if I’d not run out of icing sugar I would have added more! I think that although you should pour the orange juice gradually into the icing sugar until you have a spreadable, but not too thick consistency, the runny mixture makes the cake even more moist and tangy.

I’d like to try the same recipe with lemons – but perhaps it would be too tart? Maybe a mixture of the two would be interesting.

It’s dead easy, measure all the ingredients into a bowl and combine well, pour into a base lined 20cm cake tin, bake at 180 degrees for about 35 minutes. When the cake is cool heat the gently jam in a pan and brush over the cake then pour over the icing sugar and orange juice mixture and allow to set (or ooze in my case):

175g soft margarine (or butter if you’d prefer! – I have to admit Dan, i used marg but I think it still tastes great)
175g caster sugar
3 eggs
175g self-raising flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
Gated rind and juice of one large lemon

To finish:
About 2 tablespoons of apricot jam
100g icing sugar
Finely shredded rind and juice of 1/2 orange