semolina, coconut and orange syrup cake

I am a huge fan of Yotam Ottolenghi's recipes. He isn't scared of strong flavours, the recipes often challenge my preconceived ideas of what ingredients 'should' work together and the methods are usually fairly straight forward. What's not to love? Below is my variation on the semolina, coconut and marmalade cake that can be found in the recent book Jerusalem. I didn't really fancy the loaf shape suggested in the book so I used one 22cm spring form tin. Also, I couldn't find orange blossom water in my local shops so instead created a delicious lemon and rosewater syrup instead. I found it really worked well but feel free to stick with the original if you prefer.

Ingredients

WET:
180ml sunflower or vegetable oil
240ml orange juice (roughly two large oranges)
160g orange marmalade (fine cut or peel-free)
4 medium eggs
grated zest of 1 orange

DRY:
70g caster sugar
70g dessicated coconut
90g plain flour
180g semolina
2tbsp ground almonds
2 tsp baking powder

SYRUP:
200g caster sugar
140ml water
1 tbsp orange blossom water (or 2 tsp rosewater (or to taste) and 2 tsp lemon juice)

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/160C FAN/gas mark 4. Grease and base line your tin.
2. Mix together the wet ingredients until fully combined.
3. In a separate bowl mix together the dry ingredients then add the dry to the wet and mix thoroughly. The mixture should be quite runny.
4. Bake in the oven for around 45-60 mins or until a skewer comes out cleanly.
5. Towards the end of the cooking time combine the syrup ingredients in a small saucepan and bring to the boil over a gentle heat then remove from the heat. 
6. When the cake is cooked remove it from the oven and use a skewer to make small holes all over. Carefully pour over the warm syrup making sure you use it all. In Jerusalem they recommend brushing the syrup over and waiting for the syrup to be soaked in before repeating then continuing the process until all the syrup is used. I am far to impatient to do this but by all means feel free to do it yourself. I found with my method all the syrup got used and nothing bad happened so all is good.
7. Leave the cake to cool down a little before removing from the tins to cool completely. 
8. Serve with greek yogurt or creme fraiche, flavoured with orange blossom water if you fancy. 

Lemon, poppy seed and orange flower Ciambella

Another tasty recipe from my big sister...

"A traditional Italian cake which I have tweaked a bit so it is now crossed with a lemon drizzle style glaze and added a bit of orange flower water for good measure - just because I love it's soft floral flavour with the sharp lemon.

You could also make this flavoured with caraway seeds, orange zest, liqueur soaked fruit, chocolate chips, almonds..... It's up to you. Happy baking :)"

Ingredients
1 cup soured milk (squeeze of lemon until milk curdles - don't worry it'll look horrible but will be ok - it helps the rise!)
3 eggs
2 cups of caster sugar
3 cups of plain flour
grated zest of 2 lemons
1/2 cup poppy seeds
2 tsp vanilla essence/vanilla pod seeds
half cup vegetable oil
2 heaped teaspoons of baking powder
a little milk if too thick
Pinch salt

Glaze:
1/2 cup sugar
Juice of 2 lemons
2 tbs of orange flower water

1. Grease a ciambella/bundt tin, and dust it lightly with flour. Preheat the oven to 180°C, 350°F. 
2. Sift flour and baking powder into a bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil, sugar and lemon zest and salt. Beat using an electric whisk for about 3-4 mins 
3. Stir in poppy seeds, if it’s a bit thick add a little extra milk. 
4. Pour the mixture into the tin, and bake in the oven for about 50 minutes until well risen and a skewer comes out clean.
5. Turn off the oven, and remove cake 
6. Mix the glaze ingredients together. Poke a few holes with skewer then pour over glaze 
7. Leave it to cool in the tin 
8. The glaze should leave a nice crunchy topping. This cake can be eaten straight away but is even better the day after all the flavours have mingled. Great with a strong coffee at breakfast time but you don't need me to tell you when you can eat cake!