The Dairy-Free Zone. Good food, no cow juice.

Madeira Cake

This cake makes a great alternative for people who don’t like dried fruit. If, as in our family, you end up doing both fruit and madeira, try making this one square for a different look.

For this recipe there are two alternative methods: with and without a food processor. Both ways give good results. Either way you will need an 8" / 20cm round or a 7" / 18cm square cake tin, some greaseproof paper and a wire cooling rack. Without a food processor, you will also need a large mixing bowl and an electric hand mixer.

Ingredients

8oz / 225g plain flour (sifted)
1 very heaped tsp baking powder
6oz / 175g softened dairy-free spread
6oz / 175g caster sugar
3 medium eggs
1½ tsp vanilla essence
2 tbsp soya milk/rice milk/oat milk
grated zest of 1 lemon

Method

By hand

Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 3 / 170°C / 325°F
Line and grease an 8" / 20cm round cake tin or 7" / 18cm square one.
Sift together the flour and baking powder.
Cream together the spread and sugar until light and fluffy.
Beat the eggs together in a dish and add the vanilla essence
Add the egg mixture to the spread and sugar a little at a time, adding about a dessertspoonful of flour with each addition of egg to prevent curdling. Blend each addition thoroughly.
Add the milk and lemon zest. Mix thoroughly.
Pour into the prepared tin and level the top with the back of a spoon.
Bake for 1h30 to 1h45. Test whether or not the cake is cooked by inserting a skewer. If it comes out clean the cake is cooked.
After removing the cake from the oven, leave it to cool in its tin for a few minutes, then transfer to a wire cooling rack. Remove all greaseproof paper and leave to cool.

In a processor

Put everything into the food processor and "whizz" until the mixture is smooth and looks very creamy. I tend to use the medium speed.
Pour into the tin and cook as for the hand made version.

We tend to split this cake and fill it with a layer of "butter icing", then marzipan and ice it with roll-out icing which can be decorated with marzipan holly leaves and berries or bells etc.. As with all the other cake recipes in this collection, I have made this very successfully with 81% Stone Ground flour. As before, I would advise using self-raising flour and still adding the baking powder. I put a dessertspoonful of water in with the eggs when I mix them up, to compensate for the extra absorbency of the bran content.

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