August 06, 2010

Nectarine Cake

This is a really delicious cake. In fact it's so good, I made it two days in a row. Or maybe the double baking was yet another sign of my onsetting baking OCD. When I made it for the first time, I forgot to add the peach liquor. This greatly irritated me for the whole day, so in the end I gave in and made the exact same cake again but this time with the peach liquor. AND I WAS RIGHT! Haha! The liquor intensified the overall peach flavour and added the little something to the cake. Of course the cake is perfectly alright also without the liquor. You still get a nice, tender cake with sweet nectarines, crunchy almond slices and chocolate chips (who needs an adjective with chocolate...?).


The recipe is a mix of various standard cake recipes and my own additions and I can't find my notes right now so I don't remember all the sources.

Nectarine-Cake
(with or without liquor)

30g butter at room temperature
2 egg yolks
60g sugar
25g vanilla sugar
250g yoghurt
2-3 tbsp peach liquor (optional)
250g semolina
2 tsp. baking powder
100g almond slices
160g chocolate chips
2 egg whites, beaten
1 pinch of salt
4 nectarines in slices
1 tbsp sugar to sprinkle

Preheat the oven to 175°C. Line the bottom of a springform tin (18cm diameter) and a 16cm loaf pan with baking paper and butter the sides.

Beat the butter, the egg yolks, sugar and vanilla sugar until fluffy. Mix in the yoghurt. If you want to use the peach liquor, this would be the moment not to forget to mix it in. Add the semolina, baking powder, almond slices and chocolate chips.

In a separate bowl beat the egg whites together with the salt until stiff. Fold the egg whites into the batter.

Pour half of the mix into the springform tin and tuck nectarine slices into the batter. Sprinkle a tablespoon of sugar over everything.

Pour half of the rest of the batter into the loaf pan, layer it with nectarines and cover the fruit with the remaining batter.