Orange and Hazelnut Cake: Niki Louca shares her favourite recipe

An orange hazelnut cake is a delicious and flavourful dessert that combines the zesty freshness of oranges with the rich, nutty taste of hazelnuts. The original recipe calls for blood oranges, but you can also use normal oranges.

It’s an easy and very quick cake to put together, although it needs approximately an hour to cook. The recipe is originally from Angela Palermo, who is a renowned pastry chef. This cake serves between 12-15 people. Give it a go – it’s a delicious cake.

Niki Louca from My Greek Kitchen shares her favourite recipe with The Greek Herald. You can follow her on Instagram @mygreekkitchen for more!

Ingredients

• 300 gm unsalted butter at room temp.
• 400 gm caster sugar
• 2 medium size lemons, zested and juiced
• 2 oranges, zested and juiced
• 255 gm hazelnut meal
• 6 eggs
• 125gm Greek yoghurt
• 150gm plain flour

Orange Syrup

• 220gm caster sugar
• 125ml orange juice
• 2 oranges thinly sliced, skin on, seeds removed.

Method

1. For the syrup – combine sugar and orange juice in a medium size saucepan and stir till sugar dissolves.  Add orange slices and simmer till tender.
2. Line a 24-25 cm cake tin with baking paper and arrange the orange slices in the base of the cake tin (as shown in photo).  Drizzel 100ml of the reserved syrup over the orange slices making sure they don’t move.
3. For the cake – preheat oven to 180C fan force. 
4. Using a hand-held mixer, beat the sugar, butter and orange and lemon rinds till soft and creamy (about 3-4 minutes).  Set aside.
5. In another bowl add the hazelnut meal and polenta and mix together.  Add half to the butter mixture and mix on low speed to combine.  Add eggs one at a time, making sure they are well combined and scrape the bowl down between each addition.
6. Add remainder hazelnut mixture, the juices, yoghurt and flour – mix on low speed till well combined.
7. Gently spoon the mixture over the orange slices and smooth it over with a spatula.  Bake for approx. 1 hour till golden and a skewer comes out clean.  Allow to cool slightly in the tin for approx. 10-15 mins and then carefully turn onto a wire rack till fully cooled. Transfer to a cake platter.
8. Can serve as is or with left over syrup and a dallop of Greek yoghurt or with double thick cream. Keep refrigerated. 

Niki Louca runs cooking classes in Melbourne. For more or to book classes visit My Greek Kitchen at www.mygreekkitchen.com.au or Instagram @mygreekkitchen. You can email Niki at: niki@mygreekkitchen.com.au.