Raspberry and Almond Cake

There is something about raspberries and almonds together that just works. The tart juicy berries cut though the sweet nuttiness and both flavours benefit. Any cake where ground almonds replace some of the flour is delicious, moist and denser in texture and this one is no exception however, and this may sound contradictory, it manages to be light at the same time i.e. you don’t feel like you’ve eaten a house brick. I’m hoping that as it contains fruit and nuts it can be classified as a health food – perhaps even helping you meet your ‘five a day’ requirement…..ok, maybe not!

As you can see it’s quite an imposing, formal looking cake:

I love it when a cake has hidden treasure that cannot be seen from the outside; cooked raspberries turn a beautiful jewel-like colour:



So, that’s the fruit requirement covered, but it’s also important to get some dairy – good for the teeth and bones. This is how I like to keep osteoporosis at bay:

It is simply lightly whipped cream with vanilla added to taste.

Ingredients:
250g unsalted butter
250g golden caster sugar
4 eggs
175g ground almonds
100g self-raising flour
150g fresh raspberries (frozen won’t work as you need them to hold their shape)
50g flaked almonds

How to make:
- preheat oven to 190°C/fan oven 170°C/375°F/ Gas mark 5 and grease a 20cm springform cake tin, lining the base with greaseproof paper.
- Cream the butter and sugar together until smooth and pale.
- Beat in the eggs one at a time, the mixture might curdle towards the end but don’t worry about it.
- Fold in the almonds, flour and raspberries. Try not to mush the raspberries up too much as it looks nicer. If the mix gets too thick add a dash of milk to loosen it. I didn’t have to in the example photographed above.
- Spoon mix into the tin and smooth the top. Scatter the flaked almonds evenly over the top.
- Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. I found it took a bit longer than this but check on it after 40 minutes. Mine took 1 hour 5 minutes in total.
- Leave to cool before removing from the tin. You can dust it with icing sugar before serving.
- I served it with lightly whipped cream.
- Bask in glory at the wonderful thing you have made.
- Eat.