Citrus Almond Semolina Cake

One of the 'stars' in our garden is the huge lemon tree. It's a very old gnarly one that's produced a fabulous crop this year. I have almost exhausted ways to use them. My three large jars of preserved lemons, numerous batches of muffins and bagged up gifts to give to friends has barely made a hole in branches laden with fruit.
So it was a no brainer when searching for a dessert for a special dinner, it had to be lemon something. Our guests included one old friend (hubby's flat mate from the 1960's) visiting from out of town, the other guest a 'girl' celebrating her 39th birthday. Apart from knowing us, they had one other thing in common - both were vegetarians. Sunday was the day set aside to produce a three course dinner for four.
I always love the challenge of finding new untried recipes for such occasions. I like to have time to think about what to cook and create and of course vegetarian food always takes longer to prepare and cook! Sometimes I think it is a bit like a painting..... there is often so many layers to it - and it takes time to get it just right.
The menu ended up as follows - Spicy Lentil soup, A Very Full Tart as a main (a Yotam Ottolenghi recipe), two side dishes, one Johnson's Coleslaw and the other, Carrot and Sesame Salad and for dessert, a Citrus Almond Semolina Cake. The starter and one of the side dishes you will recognise from previous posts. The Carrot salad is a new Ruth Pretty number, and an absolute winner! The main was truly a labour of love ( I made my own wholemeal pastry too) but it was so worth it, and the good part was we were still eating it two nights later.
Back to the cake. I have made a few variations of Lemon cake over the years but I think this is my favourite so far. It may be the combination of orange and lemon, or the ground almonds and fine semolina but it has such a lovely flavour, texture and lightness about it. I didn't bother with the compote as I was short on time, the alternative marmalade reduction I made was really nice though.

The final meal came together well, hubby raved about it the next day! A triumph- we loved it he said! Was it really I say? how nice......makes all that chopping, mixing, stirring and baking all so worth it! Here it is -

Citrus Almond Semolina Cake and Citrus Compote – SST - Ray McVinnie, July 2012

Ingredients

Zest of 1 orange and 1 lemon

Juice of 1 lemon and 1 orange

200ml extra virgin olive oil or light olive oil if you prefer

220g icing sugar

1 pinch of salt

3 eggs, beaten

200g fine semolina

120g ground almonds

1 tsp baking powder

1tbsp orange flower water (optional but I think it adds that little something special)

Method

Preheat oven to 160°C (150 for fan oven)

Butter thoroughly, sides and bottom of 25cm spring form cake tin - paper the bottom too

Put zests, juices,oil, icing sugar and salt in a bowl and mix well.

Add the eggs and mix.

Add the semolina, almonds, baking powder (use a sieve to remove any lumps), add orange flower water. Mix well – but don’t beat

Pour into the tin and place in the oven for 30 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean

Remove from the oven and cool

Serve in wedges warm or at room temperature. Serve with compote if desired (and/or cream)

Citrus Compote

1 orange (thinly sliced)

1 lemon (thinly sliced)

½ cup castor sugar

Put fruit in small saucepan, cover well with water

Bring to the boil and boil 10 minutes, drain well and add sugar to fruit.

Add ¼ cup water and bring to the boil stirring to dissolve the sugar. Boil 4 minutes until syrupy.

Remove from the heat, cool and chill.

(Due to time I used some marmalade with a little water added and boiled for 4 minutes to reduce – it was just as nice)

 

The other courses - all that was left over!