Sunday, February 3, 2008

Afternoon Tea


My friend S was visiting for tea and a chat on Saturday afternoon so of course I had to provide something to much on. The kind of cake that goes with tea at 3pm is quite different from the kind you have for dessert, something simple yet tasty is what is called for on these occasions. Clotilde's Gâteau au Yaourt has been on my to-bake-list since I got my copy of her book last summer, however I felt that it need some addition. Then I remebered that Caroline at Bibliocook enhanced hers with pistachio nuts and lemon zest and I decided that this was the way to go, I went with Clotilde's quantitites as she has them in metric in her book.


80ml vegtable oil
250g whole milk natural yoghurt (I used Glenisk, but be careful as the packaging for the whole milk and low fat versions is very similar)
200g sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
zest of 1 lemon
a handful of shelled pistachio nuts, chopped
240g plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder 1 tsp bread soda pinch of salt
  • grease a 22-cm springform pan with some of the oil
  • beat together yogurt and sugar, add the eggs one at a time
  • beat in the remaining oil and the vanilla
  • gently fold in the lemon zest and the nuts
  • sieve together the flour, baking powder, bread soda and salt
  • fold gently into the cake mix
  • bake at 180 degrees for 35-40 mins
As you can see from the picture above mine was a tad overcooked even though I did a bare 35 mins at 170 degrees (turned it down ten as I have a fan oven). My oven is brand new so I must remember to bear it's efficiency in mind in the future!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

My home oven is the same. It overcooks everything!

Rachel@fairycakeheaven said...

My oven has gone wonky since christmas, sometimes it's fine and others it's not!! VERY annoying.

and mmmmmmmmm cake

Caroline@Bibliocook said...

I had awful problems with my oven in the second-to-last flat in Dublin until I got an oven thermometer and discovered that it was - on average - 20 degrees less than it was supposed to be! I'd definitely recommend getting your hands on one so you can double check the temp, it saves a lot of frustration and throwing out in the long run. Glad that you liked my pistachio and lemon variation!

Sadhbh said...

I made the gateuax au yaourt and added some rasperries for a change!!
also i can sympathise with the oven problem, have to reduce temp and cooking time for absolutely everything in mine!!