Cakes & Bakes: Courgette loaf cake

We’ve begun to harvest a couple of nice crops from our little veg patch now (apart from the strawberries, which provided a running fruit buffet for the local mice). We had some lovely new potatoes this week, and the courgettes are doing very well indeed.

So, what to do with them? They’ll be perfect in all manner of stir-fries and other savoury dishes, but we decided to start with a courgette loaf cake.

They’re incorporated into the batter as you would with carrots in the better known carrot cake. In this recipe they’re combined with walnuts, sultanas, nutmeg and cinnamon.

The resulting cake was a great success and has proved very popular here at H is for Home headquarters. We’ve had it for the past few days with our afternoon brew. It’s very moist as it is, but we’ve found that a scrape of butter works fantastically well. There’s not a huge amount of sugar in the recipe – but I think it works. It’s well worth giving this cake a try… with either shop-bought or home-grown courgettes.

Gardeners and allotment-holders often say that they have a glut of courgettes, so this is a perfect use for some of them. Also, if you have trouble getting vegetables into your kids, they’re wonderfully well hidden – they’ll never know!

You can be very versatile with this recipe. Substitute pecans for the walnuts. Swap raisins and/or prunes for the sultanas. Add a couple tablespoons of orange juice instead of the vanilla extract. Use honey or maple syrup as an alternative to the brown sugar… or you can sprinkle golden granulated over the top just before it goes into the oven, if you’d like it sweeter. Similarly, for additional sweetness, you could top it with a cream cheese frosting.

Click here or on the image below to save the recipe to Pinterest

Buttered slices of home-made courgette loaf cake | H is for Home

Courgette cake

BBC Good Food

Print recipe Pin recipe

Cook Time 1

Course Dessert

Cuisine British

Servings 10

Ingredients

2 large eggs
125 ml/4fl oz vegetable oil
85 g/3oz soft brown sugar
350 g/12oz courgette coarsely grated
1 tsp vanilla extract
300 g/10½oz plain flour
2 tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
½ tsp baking powder
85 g/3oz walnuts roughly chopped
140 g/5oz sultanas

Instructions

Heat your oven to 180ºC/350ºF/Gas mark 4
Grease and line a 1kg/2lb loaf tin with baking parchment or paper liner
In a large mixing bowl, whisk the eggs, oil and sugar
Add the grated courgette and vanilla extract
In another bowl, combine the remaining (dry) ingredients with a pinch of salt
Stir the dry ingredients into the wet mixture, then pour into the loaf tin.
Bake for an hour or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes away clean
Allow to cool in its tin for a few minutes before removing it and leaving to cool completely on a wire rack

The cooked cake can be frozen for up to 1 month

It's delicious sliced and spread with a little butter

Keyword courgette, loaf cake, tea loaf, zucchini

Cakes & Bakes: Lime and coconut iced loaf cake

Our food shopping habits have completely changed; both since moving to rural Wales and since the Covid-19 lockdown. We’ve been driving the few miles into the nearest town to the supermarket (after popping into the hardware store) about once every week and a half to a fortnight… much less often than usual.

I had a look in the store cupboard and fridge to see what needed to be used up before it started deteriorating. I found a few limes that were rolling around the drawer of the fridge; like us, they’ve been waiting for a sunny day to go into a gin & tonic… there hasn’t been one for a while!

Seeing as there’s been only wind & rain in the forecast, I thought that I’d better put them to another use. An afternoon tea-time loaf cake always goes down well in this house, so I whipped us up a lime and coconut iced loaf cake.

It’s very strange, I can’t stand lemons, oranges or tangerines – especially the smell of the zest when they’ve been peeled. However, for some reason, I quite like limes and grapefruit.

The secret to this cake is pre-toasting the desiccated coconut before adding it to the batter. It really brings out the flavour. It’s almost like a piña colada in cake form!

Click here or on the image below to save my recipe to Pinterest

Lime and coconut iced loaf cake

2020-07-01 17:45:08

Serves 6

For the cake

100g/3½oz desiccated coconut
150g/5oz butter, softened
150g/5oz caster sugar
2 eggs
juice & zest of 1 lime
150g/5oz plain flour
2tsp baking powder
pinch of salt

For the glaze

150g icing sugar
juice & zest of 1 lime

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For the cake

Line the base and sides of a 900g (2lb) loaf tin with baking parchment or pre-made loaf tin liner
Preheat the oven to 170ºC/150ºC fan/325ºF/Gas mark 3
Lightly toast the desiccated coconut in a heavy-bottomed frying or sauté pan, either on the hob or in the oven. Toss every couple of minutes to ensure it is toasted evenly and doesn't burn. Set aside to cool.
In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar
Lightly whisk the eggs in a medium-sized measuring jug. Slowly pour the beaten eggs into the creamed mixture while stirring constantly
Stir in the juice and zest of the lime
Mix in the toasted desiccated coconut
In a medium-sized mixing bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt
Fold the flour into the batter using a spatula or large spoon
Spoon the batter into the prepared loaf tin, using the bak for the spoon/spatula to level the top
Bake for 50 minutes to an hour or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes away clean
Allow to cool completely

For the glaze

Sift the icing sugar into a measuring jug to remove any lumps
Pour in the lime juice and zest and mix thoroughly. It should be a thick paste consistency - add a couple teaspoons of water/icing sugar if the mixture is too thick/thin
Pour the glaze evenly over the top of the cake

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Pecan toffee loaf cake

Since lock-down, Justin has been the one that’s been going into the supermarket while I wait in the car outside. Last week, I asked him to get me some walnuts as they’re great in chocolate cake and brownies. When he got back to the car, he said that there weren’t any walnuts, so he bought a bag of pecans.

I love pecans, they’re one of my favourite nuts; I’ve used them in mixed nut brittle, cookies and blondies. This time I’ve made a pecan toffee loaf cake.

The original recipe, from the BBC Good Food website, is double the amount and makes a round cake that serves eight. There are only 2 of us, so I made a little loaf cake. After I’d put it in the oven, I thought that it would have improved it if I’d sprinkled a couple of tablespoons of Demerara sugar over the top first. It would have given an extra crunchy bite… next time, maybe.

It went down a treat with a cupppa (coffee for me, tea for Justin) – the toasted pecan topping, the little bit of mixed spice and drizzle of maple syrup at the end really worked well together. A side serving of vanilla ice cream is another yummy accompaniment.

Click here or on the image below to save the recipe to Pinterest

Pecan toffee loaf cake

2020-06-10 17:35:41

Serves 8

Cook Time

30 min

Cook Time

30 min

Ingredients

150g/5oz pecan halves
70g/2½oz stoned dates
100g/3½oz butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
100g/3½oz light muscovado sugar
½tsp mixed spice
2 eggs, beaten
70g/2½oz self-raising flour
maple syrup, to serve

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Instructions

Put 50g of the pecans into a food processor and pulse until fine before decanting them into a mixing bowl
Put the dates into a small saucepan with enough water to cover, boil for 5 minutes until very soft. Drain, discarding the liquid, then whizz in the processor until puréed. Leave to cool
Heat your oven to 180ºC/fan 160C/Gas mark4
Butter and line a 500g/1lb loaf tin
Beat the butter, sugar and spice together until lighter and creamy
Tip in the dates, ground pecans, eggs and a pinch of salt and beat briefly until smooth
Fold in the flour with a metal spoon, then spoon into the loaf tin and level the top
Sprinkle the remaining pecans over the top (don't press them in), then bake for 30 mins or until risen and golden and an inserted skewer comes out clean
Allow to cool for a few minutes before removing from the tin, slicing and serving

Notes

Jane Hornby advises to serve warm, with generous drizzles of maple syrup and scoops of maple crunch ice cream
Justin enjoyed it with a scoop of vanilla ice cream

By Jane Hornby

Adapted from BBC Good Food

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Fruity Easter loaf cake

Last week, we tried some of teapigs hot cross bun tea and thought it would be marvellous as an ingredient in a fruity Easter loaf cake.

We incorporated the spice flavours into the cake by soaking the dried fruit in the brewed tea – overnight is best, but do it for a couple of hours at least.

The batter is a little on the wet side, so the fruit may end up mostly in the bottom two thirds of the loaf. You can reserve a little of the soaked fruit before adding the egg and other ingredients and scatter them on the top at the end – just before you sprinkle over the granulated sugar.

Our hunch was right, the hot cross bun tea flavour really works well in a tea cake loaf. It’s a lovely moist cake and the sprinkle of granulated sugar over the top gives a nice crunch. Serve plain, or with a spread of butter and – of course – a cup of tea.

Click here to save our fruity Easter loaf cake recipe to Pinterest

Fruity Easter loaf cake

2020-03-25 18:22:00

Serves 8

Ingredients

175g/6oz mixed dried fruit (currants, sultanas, raisins etc. Chopped, dried apple rings would be lovely)
175ml/6 fl oz teapigs hot cross bun tea (brewed for 3-4 mins)
1 egg
100g/3½oz brown soft sugar
140g/5oz self raising flour
2 tbsp granulated sugar

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Instructions

Brew a large, strong mug of tea using one of the teapigs hot cross bun tea 'temples'
Put the mixed dried fruit into a medium mixing bowl
Pour the tea into the mixing bowl (it should just cover all the fruit)
Cover the mixing bowl with reusable food cover and leave to soak for a few hours, ideally overnight, to allow the tea to plump up the fruit
Preheat the oven to 170ºC/375ºF/Gas mark 4
Grease & line a 450g/1lb loaf tin
In a small measuring jug, lightly beat the egg before adding it to the mixed fruit and any un-soaked liquid
Add the sugar and flour and combine well
Pour into the loaf tin and sprinkle over the granulated sugar
Bake for 40-50 minutes or until an skewer inserted into the centre comes away clean
Leave the cake in its tin to cool completely before turning out
Slice and serve buttered

Notes

The loaf should keep for a couple of weeks if wrapped in baking parchment and kept in a cool, airtight container

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/