Naartjie Almond Cake and Cupcakes

My plan this weekend was to make three cakes but on account of me not finding all the ingredients for the cakes I could only make one.

I've been meaning to make naartjie almond cake for awhile, but the fear of it not turning out well or it not being received well always left me hesitant.

I awoke at three am to boil the naartjies, in question, for two hours and left them to cool before puree-ing them. Note this is a flourless cake, which is what made me apprehensive. I wasn't sure if it would come out of the tin well, and it being a fruit cake meant it would burn easily. So I opted for cupcakes, which I could watch and time to ensure no burning, and a cake (just to see how it came out) for this recipe.


Its so simple and only uses about five ingredients - sugar, naartjies, powdered almonds, eggs and baking powder. The trick with this recipe is trying to balance the bitterness of the naartjies and the sweetness of the sugar. I found it helped to add a bit of vanilla to pureed fruit.

This time I also tried my hand at decorating. I used a marshmallow fondant icing, which I had made on Thursday afternoon, to fashion my decorations. It was quite a mission to try and colour the icing. It occurs to me now that I should have added the colour to the melted marshmallows before turning them into fondant. Anyway, I fashioned flowers - or what I think flowers look like.

For the actual icing bit I used a hazelnut chocolate German equivalent of Nutella. Delicious.

I'm still not sure how I want to ice the cake version of the recipe - perhaps I'll serve it as is or maybe add sticky orange preserve.

Let me know what you think and please feel free to make suggestions for recipes I should try out next.