A couple of weeks back my regular fruit bag from Riverford Organics arrived, apples, a mango and a lot of green skinned satsumas - green miyagawa satsumas. And a note, explaining that these satsumas would stay green, so not to wait for them to ripen as they were ripe already. Now, never one to discriminate against someone(thing) for having a touch of 'verdigris' I was happily snacking on them at work. Slightly tart, but these are early satusumas as they're a fruit I normally associate with winter. And then I had a 'vision, almost like a prophecy'... Satsuma drizzle cake. I know, it sounds truly crazy, but bear with me
I duly kept 5 of these aside to, when blessed with time, turn into a satsuma drizzle cake. Having been overwhelmed by the success of the lime drizzle, I thought I'd follow Vanessa's recipe more closely and deal with one of my issues. Cardamom. I love the scent. But, it smells like perfume to me, not like a spice and I actively avoid it because much as I don't want to wear perfume that makes me smell of biscuits, neither do I want to eat food that smells of Chanel.
But, much like the pastry and the repeated attempts at aubergine (still not winning) I felt like I needed to address this. So...all right, why not... into my mixture went 5 green cardamom pods, lightly crushed, the outers discarded and the seeds pounded to a powder in my pestle and mortar. I actually really like it. There is the faint sugesstion of perfume in the cake, but the robust tartness of the satsumas works with it really pleasingly to take that edge away.
The recipe is exactly as the Lime Drizzle cake, but with the zest and juice of 5 satsumas (they were tiny) and the cardamom folded in with the flour. I used a square cake tin this time to see if a slightly flatter cake would alter the absorbtion of the drizzle. Still yummy, but I really must buy a skewer at some point soon.
And this time, as there's only me at home... pictures!
*This post is brought to you courtesy of myself, The Wizard and I from Wicked. If you had to be told, really? REALLY?
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