Blood Orange Yogurt Cake

This blood orange cake is one of the easiest cakes that you can bake. This loaf cake gets is moist texture from yogurt in the cake and has a gorgeous pink frosting using the juice of blood oranges. I called this beauty Sumire.

What are blood oranges? These are a variety of orange with a distinct purple flesh from the anthocyanins present in the oranges. They come in a few varieties: arnold/moro, ruby, tarocco (sweetest) and sanguinello where you can see the darker pigment through the skin. In Australia Arnold/Moro is the most grown which is a dark pigmented flesh. The colour is from Anthocyanin which is the polyphenol pigment also found in blueberries and red wine. The flavour of blood orange is slightly less tart and sweeter than regular orange.

Yogurt like buttermilk makes cakes soft due to the acidity in the yogurt helping to break down the gluten strands. I always leave my cakes to rest for 5 minutes after mixing them. It's a little quirk I just started doing because I want the glutens (which you work up when mixing the batter) to relax a bit before baking so that the cake is soft and not tough in texture.

Which size and type of tin to use? I made this in a small 6 cup bundt tin (you can also get 9 or 12 cup bundt tins). This is also ideal for a 6 cup loaf tin (around 21 x 11 x 6 cms or 8 1/2x4 1/2x2 1/2 inches).

The key to drippable icing is to add the juice very slowly. Start with 1 tablespoon of juice and then add the other 1/2 tablespoon. You only need a very small amount of liquid to make icing and it's easy to make it too runny. Blood Oranges colour the cake itself a slight purple grey. But that same purple juice makes the most gorgeous icing colour. You can always use regular oranges for the cake and blood oranges for the icing.

Other recipes using blood oranges: this is the cake I think I'm most known for - the Spectacular Upside Down Blood Orange Cake. There's also a blood orange, coconut and carrot cake, Blood Orange Chiffon Cake, Blood Orange & Poppyseed Baby Bundt Cakes, Blood Orange Mochi Donuts, Portokalopita Greek Filo Blood Orange Cake, Middle Eastern Blood Orange Cake, Blood Orange Friands, Blood Orange Curd and savoury lovers, here's a recipe for Blood Orange Roasted Chicken or a Prawn and Blood Orange Salad!

I have something quite exciting to share with you Dear Reader. It's something that I've been working on for a while. It sort of got paused over COVID and then we resumed it because it was so much fun. But the news is...Nina and I made a podcast called Your Cake Dealer!! We came up with the name because that's what I feel like (seriously, I always have cake around) and that's what I call myself when Nina comes to pick up a cake from me. It's a podcast about food from two different perspectives: a foodie and a fitness trainer. Whether you live for food (like me) or just don't understand what the fuss about food is all about (Nina) you'll relate ;)

I decided to do a podcast with Nina because for the longest time whenever people would see videos of Nina and I working out and hanging out they'd love it and ask for more videos of Nina and I. So this podcast is for you - the people out there that enjoy food and enjoy learning about food but don't take food or themselves too seriously. Each episode is about a different food topic from dinner party disasters, comfort food, sneaky tricks that food brands use on us, the time I kissed a chef to staying fit during lockdown. And of course each episode features a food that I make for Nina that matches the theme along with the recipe for it. It will all be available for free on all the regular channels but if you want to support us there will also be a Patreon link too.

We are just putting our final touches together for Your Cake Dealer and it will be released hopefully next week! Follow us at Your Cake Dealer on Instagram to keep updated on when the episodes go live. They'll be released weekly and if you just want to hang out with two friends that are probably just like you, I think you'll like it!

Lots of love,

Lorraine

xxx

Blood Orange Yogurt Cake

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Preparation time: 25 minutes

Cooking time: 45 minutes

Serves: 8

• 1.5 cups/225g cake flour*
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 cup/220g caster or superfine sugar
• Pinch salt
• 1/2 cup/125ml/4flozs. oil
• 3 eggs, room temperature
• 1/2 cup/125g yogurt (any flavour)
• 1/4 cup/60ml/2flozs blood orange or orange juice
• Finely grated zest of 1 orange or blood orange

For icing

• 100g/3.5ozs. icing or powdered sugar
• 1.5-2 tablespoons blood orange juice

Cake flour can be purchased at the supermarket or you can make it yourself. For the recipe, measure 1.5 cups of plain all purpose flour and replace 3 tablespoons of it with cornflour/fine cornstarch and whisk together to mix

Step 1 - Preheat oven to 160C/320F. Butter and flour the inside of a bundt tin. Mix 1 tablespoon of melted butter and 1 tablespoon of flour and brush the inside of a bundt tin. Take a bit of time to make sure that you butter all the crevices. OR line a loaf tin on the base and sides.

Step 2 - Sift the cake flour and baking powder together in a bowl and whisk with the sugar and salt. In a jug measure the oil and whisk with eggs, yogurt, blood orange juice and zest. Make a well in the centre and stir in the oil mixture in 4-5 lots making sure that there are no lumps. Let this mixture rest for 5 minutes. Scoop into the tin and bake for 45-50 minutes or until centre springs back when gently pressed down.

Step 3 - Cool in the tin and then place on a serving plate. Place the icing or powdered sugar in a food processor and whizz until all lumps disappear. Drizzle in the blood orange juice until you get a thick, slowly drippy texture. Start with 1.5 tablespoons and then add the other 1/2 tablespoon. If it's still too thick then add drops of water.