Apricot, Almond and Buttermilk Breakfast Cake (GF)

I know what you’re thinking.

Cake? For Breakfast? Are you crazy?

No, I’m not (well, maybe a little), but seen as how biscuits are now widely acceptable at breakfast time, why not cake? As long as it’s got ‘breakfast’ in the title, it’s okay? Yes?

Besides, if it’s your birthday, then cake for breakfast is the law.

Okay, so it’s not the law.

But it should be.

Anyhoo, this cake has everything one requires for a hearty breakfast – nuts, fruit, a smattering of oats and honey. See, it’s perfectly alright to eat this first thing in the morning. It’s like muesli. But as cake. Serve it with a dollop of greek yoghurt with a little honey mixed through it and bingo! A perfectly balanced breakfast. Just add your own preferred morning beverage (as long as it’s tea).

Now, I’m an early riser, but even I didn’t want to get up at 5.30am in order to have this cake ready to eat at a more sociable time of the morning, so I suggest you make this the night before and leave it to cool while you sleep. A bit of pottering around the kitchen in your jammies, watching the Kitchen Aid do all the work while you chop a few apricots is no hardship.

What is hard it trying not to eat this cake before you go to bed. It smells amazing as it cooks.

Fortunately the searing heat will prevent you from stuffing it in your face. Just. Be patient for a while and dream of eating it instead.

APRICOT, ALMOND & BUTTERMILK BREAKFAST CAKE

Ingredients:

• 200g caster sugar
• Zest of 1 orange
• 125g unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 135g plain gluten-free flour
• 135g ground almonds
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 140ml buttermilk
• 170g fresh apricots, stoned and cut into bite-size pieces
• 30g flaked almonds
• 10g gluten-free oats
• Drizzle of honey

Method:

1. Grease and line a 23cm / 9 inch springform cake tin and pre-heat the oven to 180C / 350F.
2. Mix the sugar and orange zest together, then beat in the butter until light and fluffy.
3. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until just incorporated.
4. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, ground almonds, baking powder and salt.
5. Add half the buttermilk to the butter, sugar, egg mixture, followed by half of the dry ingredients. Mix and repeat with the remaining halves.
6. Fold in the apricots. Spoon the batter into the tin and level out.
7. Sprinkle the flaked almonds and oats on top and then drizzle over the honey.
8. Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for another 25 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. If it starts to colour too much, cover again with the foil.
9. Leave to cool for 10 minutes before placing on a wire rack and removing the sides of the tin only. This cake is very soft and moist so don’t take it off the base of the tin until it has cooled completely, otherwise it will break.

The recipe is adapted from The Cake Hunter, via Sweet magazine.