Our fruit bowl is overflowing with oranges this week, and we all know what that means… Anytime it looks like a fruit is going to spoil because we didn’t get to eat it, I’ll throw it into some kind of bread or cake. Today, I couldn’t find a recipe that matched what I wanted to make (sure, there were some, but they required ingredients I didn’t have or ratios that didn’t sound appealing).
I knew I wanted to use some of the cardamom I had left over from my clementine cookies of a few months ago, so this recipe is extremely loosely based off of this recipe, but really, not at all.
I also adapted it for my bundt pan instead of a loaf pan, and had to do a bit of cup counting to figure out how much stuff I’d need to fill my 10-cup bundt. I was really close… but forgot to account for the super fluff of baking powder, which seems to be even more fluffy in citrus recipes.
Anyway, Charlie loves this muffin-textured cake, and if you don’t have cardamom or poppy, it would probably still be awesome.
Ingredients
3 cups all-purpose flour
6 tablespoons butter or margarine, softened
6 tablespoons shortening
1 2/3 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 cup milk
1.5 tablespoon baking powder
1.5 teaspoon salt
1.5 teaspoon ground cardamom
1.5 tsp vanilla I think I’d omit this next time. It overpowers the cardamom. Insert back in if you don’t have cardamom.
Zest and juice from 2 medium oranges (that is, about 3/4 cup juice and maybe 2 tablespoons of zest)
2 tablespoons poppy seeds (I used only one because that’s what I had, but it could probably have had a few more, texturally)
Directions
Mix the dry ingredients, that is, the flour, cardamom, salt, and baking powder. In a separate large mixing bowl, cream the butter, shortening and sugar until light and fluffy. One at a time, beat in the eggs, milk, and orange juice.
FYI, You’re mixing citrus and milk: It might curdle! Don’t freak out! Lots of cake and muffin recipes call for buttermilk. And when you don’t have buttermilk, they tell you to substitute by curdling some milk with lemon or vinegar. It might look gross for a minute, but just keep stirring it all back together, and once it’s smooth, carry on.
Beat on low speed for 30 seconds; beat on high for 3 minutes, or give it some good ol’ elbow grease. Stir in orange zest, then poppy seeds.
This spilled just a bit out of my 10 cup bundt pan, which I baked at 325 on the lower rack for about an hour, since that’s what my bundt pan usually calls for. Make sure you grease your pan well, since this is the first recipe that stuck in my bundt pan, though, it could easily have been my fault, as I was baking around a refrigerator repair. I imagine that you could make some awesome muffins from this, too, probably at 350 for around 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for a few minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack to cool completely.
