Thursday 1 September 2011

Nigella's Rosemary Madeira Loaf


This rosemary madeira loaf tastes surprisingly complex for such a simple recipe. The cake, an old favourite of Nigella Lawson's which demands minimal ingredients, is delicious proof that baking your own cake is cheaper, healthier and so much tastier than buying one. You can use lavender if you prefer a softer, milder taste; personally I love the woody dusky sweetness the fresh rosemary brings to this madeira.




Recipe
Serves 8
Taken from Nigella Lawson's recipe from her wonderful baking bible, How To Be A Domestic Goddess, a call to bake if ever there was one. Buy the book on Amazon here.

200g golden caster sugar
250g unsalted butter, room temperature
210g self raising flour
90g plain flour
3 large eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 tablespoons milk
approx 2 teaspoons fresh rosemary needles, chopped small
1-2 tablespoons golden caster sugar or rosemary sugar

1. Turn the oven to 170C (150C fan oven) and grease and line a 2lb loaf tin.

2. Beat the butter and sugar together until smooth and combined, then add the eggs one at a time, with a spoonful of flour after each one, whisking them in.

3. When all the egg has been beaten, add the teaspoon of vanilla extract, and stir before adding the rest of the flour. Gently stir with a metal spoon until well mixed in.

4. Add the milk to the batter, stirring again gently until combined.

5. Pour the batter into the prepared baking tin, and sprinkle some caster sugar or rosemary sugar ontop.

6. Place in the oven and bake for approx 1 hour. You'll know it's done when the top bounces back under your thumb and a skewer comes out clean.

7. Leave to cool for 15 mins in the tin, before removing the cake and leaving it on a wire rack to cool.





This cake was idly baked to The Black Keys' album Brothers

3 comments:

  1. Hi Emalina

    Please help! I need to bring two cakes to work tomorrow. One needs to say, "Wow, well done on running 10k, you amazing lady!", and the other needs to say, "Wow, well done on installing the new database, which I will probably never use properly so stop offering me training please."

    Any suggestions, please?

    Katharine x

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey I'm so sorry I didn't see this earlier Katharine! I bet you made some good cakey choices. For the 1st I'd have gone for something celebratory like the Rose Petal Genoese Sponge or Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake; for the 2nd well.... what a dilemma... it would have to be something restrained as opposed to encouraging... the Rosemary Madeira Loaf would've worked well.

    Let me know what ended up baking!

    Emalina x

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  3. Hi
    Great recipe! I did notice one tiny error though - Unless I'm going silly (possible) the instructions don't tell you to add the chopped rosemary to the batter although it has it in the ingredients....
    ( threw mine in at the end and it worked great :)

    Thanks
    Susan

    ReplyDelete

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