gluten free desserts

Ok. So I wasn’t intending to post this today, but someone asked me to get this up here post haste.

So imagunna.

This is not a budget dish. The nuts can cost quite a bit and the whole cake cost me around AUD$12.

It is incredibly easy to make, tastes gorgeous and ticks the gluten-free box (which is what I was after when I made it). However, for a special occasion treat that needs to be coeliac-friendly without too much fiddling around, it is fabulous.

Fabulous, I say!

Ahem.

Flourless Orange and Almond Cake

I was wanting a birthday cake for a friend who does an awful lot of work for a group I’m involved with – she’d allowed her birthday to pass under the radar, so to speak, and this simply was not on. I’ve also always wanted to try to make a flourless cake and, as one of our number is coeliac, this seemed to be the time to do it. I thought about all the decadent flourless chocolate cake recipes that I have pinned, but she is a Japanese lady and I’ve noted her preference for lighter flavours and textures.

Then I remembered this thing called an orange and almond cake and went searching.

I found this recipe here.

It’s incredibly simple. In fact this post is going to be rather picture-heavy because there really isn’t much to describe.

You start by simmering two oranges in water for 2 hours.

Simmer your oranges.

Let them cool, then blitz them to smithereens in a food processor. They will be incredibly soft after their extended time in hot water.

Heat your oven to 190°C/375°F.

Blitz the oranges- seeds, skin and all.

Meanwhile, mix caster sugar and 6 eggs until the sugar is dissolved.

Yes. That is a lot of eggs.

It will look light and fluffy. Like this:

Well-mixed eggs and sugar…

Add your orange pulp to the mixer bowl with the eggs and sugar and give it a further whisking.

Add the orange puree to the eggs.

Now add your almond meal and baking powder. You can attempt to sift this but it may drive you mad. It may work better to simply knock as many lumps out as you can manage. Also, if you are making this for coeliacs, please, please, please check that your baking powder is gluten free too. Thank you.

Mix well.

Mix in the almond meal.

Now, line a springform pan. Mine are non-stick, so I simply covered the base with baking paper for ease of serving, and left it at that. The size of the pan is not something that really matters.

Fill a lined springform tin with your cake batter.

Scatter a couple of handfuls of flaked almonds over the top.

Scatter some flaked almonds over the top.

Then pop it into the oven for an hour or so, or until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. The almonds on the top will be nicely toasted. To make things a little easier for you, place the cake tin on a flat baking tray like a cookie sheet.

A beautifully tanned result.

Allow to cool in the tin. Run a blade around the tin before you release the spring. Sprinkle the top with some icing (confectioner’s or powdered) sugar before serving. I didn’t, as I didn’t have any that was gluten-free. The cake still tasted wonderful.

Well, this bloke thought so anyway.

Three year olds are the toughest critics, like, *ever*.

Three year olds are, like, the toughest critics *ever*

Just don’t forget to take a picture of it before you serve it up, like I may have….

Better late than never.

Flourless Orange and Almond Cake

Servings: 12
Time: 3hours
Difficulty: easy
Print

Ingredients

2 medium size oranges

6 eggs

250g superfine sugar

250g almond meal (almond flour or ground almonds)

1 tsp baking powder

2 handfuls of flaked almonds

Icing sugar, for dusting

Method

Wash the oranges well. Place them in a medium saucepan, cover with water and bring to the boil.

Turn the heat down and simmer for two hours. Remove from the water and allow to cool.

Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F. Line a 20 to 28cm springform cake tin with paper.

Place the whole oranges into a food processor and blend until smooth.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs and the sugar until the sugar has dissolved.

Add the oranges to the mix and whisk again.

Add the almond meal and baking powder and mix until well combined.

Pour the mixture into the lined tin, smooth out with a spatula and then scatter the almond flakes over the top.

Bake for 1 hour, then test with a skewer. If it comes out clean, it’s done. If not put it back until it does. The cake should be golden on top.

Allow the cake to cool on a wire rack, then dust with icing sugar. Serve with a dollop of double cream.

In Australia at the moment – to quote Robin Williams’s character in Good Morning Vietnam – “It’s hot! Damn hot!”

It’s hot Down Under.

Which means it would be nice to have something to cool down with, especially with the kids home from school for another week.

Even better, it wouldn’t be so bad to have something the kids could participate in actually making. Something which takes minutes and which wouldn’t end with them climbing the walls on added sugars and artificial colours and flavours.

Ta da!

Ladies and gents, if you’ve been following my latest posts about making yoghurt, then I’m guessing there’s some lurking in your refrigerator right about now. How about using it to make some fruit-flavoured frozen yoghurt with – wait for it! – real fruit and real yoghurt?!

Well, why not?

All you’ll need is some frozen fruit, some yoghurt and something to sweeten it with.

Mango frozen yoghurt.

Unfortunately, this is one of the rare recipes on this site that actually requires a particular appliance. Sorry. You’ll need a food processor.

You could try making this in smaller batches using a stick blender, but I give no guarantees.

So, find yourself some fruit. If you are in a screaming hurry to do this, you can easily purchase bags of frozen berries from the supermarket. If you must. However, it’s summer, there are oodles of different fruits in season right now and going for a song. My local green grocer is selling mangoes for 50 cents each.

A gorgeously ripe, in-season mango.

So, I bought a few, peeled and sliced them up and popped them in a ziploc bag in the freezer overnight. Just before Christmas I did the same with a punnet of strawberries I found on sale. Here’s how to go about it if you’ve never done it before.

1. Wash your fruit.

Wash your fruit well and allow to drain.

2. Cut out any soft bits (especially with strawberries) and slice up larger fruits, like mangoes.

Prepare your fruit so you freeze only the best bits.

3. Put them into something you can seal well. A tupperware freezer container or ziploc bag will do nicely. Squeeze out all the air you can from bags, if using. Then freeze.

Seal into an airtight container and freeze.

Simple.

Now to make your frozen yoghurt you’ll need to set up your food processor with the metal blade. The plastic one won’t work.

Trust me on this.

Add your frozen fruit.

Place your frozen fruit in the food processor bowl.

Blitz for about 30 seconds, or until decently pulverised. Add a good drizzle of sweetener: this can be honey, maple syrup, agave syrup, golden syrup or even a few heaping spoonfuls of brown sugar.

At this point, it’s important to bear in mind the properties of your fruit. The coldness of the dish will affect your perception of its sweetness, it will seem much less sweet. The strawberries in the pictures were passing sweet at room temperature (the way I like them) but were pretty tart in their frozen state. They needed a fair whack of honey to make them palatable at sub-zero temperatures.

Now add your cold, straight-out-of-the-refrigerator, yoghurt all at once and blitz again for about a minute.

Add your yoghurt and blitz.

Taste for sweetness.

The frozen fruit will have caused the yoghurt to start to freeze and your mixture should resemble soft-serve ice cream already. Feel free to eat it immediately. 😉

The finished product.

Alternatively, place it in a container in your freezer. This mixture will set quite solidly as it is lacking the additives that commercial blends have and which make them scoop-able straight from the freezer.

Take it out of the freezer about 20 mins before you are wanting to serve it. So, if you want it for dessert, take it out as you serve up your main meal…

This firm setting property makes it ideal for popsicles, paddlepops or ice lollies though! Pour your mixture into moulds and you’ve got the ideal cool down when your kids come back from their first stinking hot days of an Australian school year.

The popsicle moulds were bought at Aldi...

These popsicle moulds were bought at Aldi…

Better yet, they can help with pretty much every aspect of making the things – short of using the food processor. Just be prepared for some mess…

Frozen Fruit Yoghurt

Time: 20 mins
Difficulty: easy
Print

Ingredients

300g frozen fruit

500g chilled yoghurt (Greek, full fat, skim, soy, whatever…)

3 tablespoons honey or to taste. (You can substitute maple syrup, agave syrup, golden syrup or corn syrup if you wish)

Method

Fit the metal chopping blade into a food processor.

Add your frozen fruit and pulse for around 30 seconds or until the fruit has a relatively even texture. One or two larger pieces just add interest to the finished product.

Add your sweetener and pulse briefly.

Add all your yoghurt and blend until smooth.

May be served immediately, or frozen for several weeks in a sealed container.

Remove from the freezer at least 20 minutes before serving (or risk tears and sprained wrists).

Variation: Pour into popsicle moulds for individual treats. If you don’t have any moulds, then try using small plastic cups or tumblers with a paddle pop stick inserted into the mixture.

Run hot water around the outside of the mould to help release the treat.

	Jennifer Crockett on The Easiest Fruit Cake. Ever.…
	Sharon on Interesting times…
	concombre54 on Interesting times…
	Doon on The most important tool in you…
	Sharon on Chocolate “Paddle Pops…

Budget Bounty

Flourless Orange Almond Cake

Flourless Orange and Almond Cake

Ingredients

Method

Frozen yoghurt

Frozen Fruit Yoghurt

Ingredients

Method