Last year I made a lovely honey cake to bring into the office for Rosh Hashanah, and I wanted to do the same this year -- but I wanted to try a new recipe. I hunted around epicurious.com, and decided to try a Joan Nathan recipe for "Apricot Honey Cake" that has received positive reviews.
The first step in this recipe is to chop some dried apricots and soak them in rum for at least 30 minutes. Then you strain the apricots and reserve the soaking liquid. To make the batter, you beat eggs, and then add in honey, vegetable oil, lemon and orange juice and zest, sugar, salt, and apricot jam. You alternately add the sifted dry ingredients (flour and baking soda) and reserved rum, and then fold in the apricots. You pour the batter into a loaf pan and sprinkle on sliced almonds before baking.
I ran into a couple of problems making this cake. I agree with the many epicurious reviewers who commented how irritating it is that the recipe does not give a specific volume measurement for how much lemon juice and orange juice you are supposed to use -- the recipe simply calls for grated peel and juice of "one lemon" and "one orange." Obviously lemons and oranges can very quite a bit in size, as does the amount of juice you might get from any given piece of fruit. I made a double batch of the batter. My two lemons yielded 1.5 fluid ounces of juice and the two navel oranges yielded 6.5 fluid ounces, so I had exactly one cup of juice total.
When I added the relatively small amount of dry ingredients to the relatively large volume of liquid ingredients, I got a ton of clumps, despite the fact that I had sifted the flour. The clumps were so pervasive and persistent that I put the batter through a sieve to get rid of them (of course, the sieve caught all of the lemon and orange zest, so I then had to scoop it out of the sieve and mix it back in).
Also, a lot of the reviewers commented that the apricots sink to the bottom of the loaf while baking. I soaked my apricots in Grand Marnier instead of rum (which just made sense to me since I really don't like rum and the cake already has so many citrus flavors anyway), and as was recommended by some reviewers, I tossed the drained apricots with flour before folding them into the batter. As you can see from the photo above, all of the apricots sank straight to the bottom anyway, and the ones that were touching the bottom of the pan were burned.
I can report that I had no problem with baking times. I used the 10-inch by 5-inch loaf pans specified, and all of the batter neatly fit into the pans, with room to spare. The loaves were done baking in 50 minutes.
As far as taste, I thought that this cake had a pleasant, interesting flavor -- my favorite parts were the top (with the sliced almonds) and the bottom (with the chewy apricots) of each slice. The cake would have been better if the apricots were evenly distributed. The loaf was moist, although fairly dense, and there was a rubbery portion in the center of each slice (the slightly darker area in middle of the slice pictured above). You could taste that there was alcohol in the cake, which is something I don't particularly enjoy. Overall, I thought this cake was okay, but I definitely enjoyed last year's honey cake more.
Recipe: "Apricot Honey Cake," from The Jewish Holiday Baker by Joan Nathan, available on epicurious.com.
Previous Post: "A Delicious Start for a Sweet New Year: Majestic and Moist New Year's Honey Cake," September 8, 2010.
The first step in this recipe is to chop some dried apricots and soak them in rum for at least 30 minutes. Then you strain the apricots and reserve the soaking liquid. To make the batter, you beat eggs, and then add in honey, vegetable oil, lemon and orange juice and zest, sugar, salt, and apricot jam. You alternately add the sifted dry ingredients (flour and baking soda) and reserved rum, and then fold in the apricots. You pour the batter into a loaf pan and sprinkle on sliced almonds before baking.
When I added the relatively small amount of dry ingredients to the relatively large volume of liquid ingredients, I got a ton of clumps, despite the fact that I had sifted the flour. The clumps were so pervasive and persistent that I put the batter through a sieve to get rid of them (of course, the sieve caught all of the lemon and orange zest, so I then had to scoop it out of the sieve and mix it back in).
Also, a lot of the reviewers commented that the apricots sink to the bottom of the loaf while baking. I soaked my apricots in Grand Marnier instead of rum (which just made sense to me since I really don't like rum and the cake already has so many citrus flavors anyway), and as was recommended by some reviewers, I tossed the drained apricots with flour before folding them into the batter. As you can see from the photo above, all of the apricots sank straight to the bottom anyway, and the ones that were touching the bottom of the pan were burned.
I can report that I had no problem with baking times. I used the 10-inch by 5-inch loaf pans specified, and all of the batter neatly fit into the pans, with room to spare. The loaves were done baking in 50 minutes.
As far as taste, I thought that this cake had a pleasant, interesting flavor -- my favorite parts were the top (with the sliced almonds) and the bottom (with the chewy apricots) of each slice. The cake would have been better if the apricots were evenly distributed. The loaf was moist, although fairly dense, and there was a rubbery portion in the center of each slice (the slightly darker area in middle of the slice pictured above). You could taste that there was alcohol in the cake, which is something I don't particularly enjoy. Overall, I thought this cake was okay, but I definitely enjoyed last year's honey cake more.
Recipe: "Apricot Honey Cake," from The Jewish Holiday Baker by Joan Nathan, available on epicurious.com.
Previous Post: "A Delicious Start for a Sweet New Year: Majestic and Moist New Year's Honey Cake," September 8, 2010.
Comments