Walnut Cardamom Cake
A wonderfully simple walnut cardamom cake recipe you can bake up for any occasion.
When I was growing up, my mother had a recipe for "brun kardemummakaka," or in English, brown cardamom cake. It was heavenly. So delicious in fact, I never grew up liking your traditional chocolate cakes or birthday cakes. It was her brun kardemummakaka, or nothing.
Sadly, the book she had that recipe written in, was lost many years ago. And I only had the opportunity to make it once myself when I was in my teens, so I couldn't for the life of me remember how it was made. Unfortunately, neither could my mom.
This sparked a life long search for that old recipe, and while I'm still looking, this is the closest I've managed to come. I have added the walnuts here for a little crunch, but otherwise, the essence of this simple cake is very similar.
By swapping the all-purpose flour for Cassava flour this can be made gluten-free; however, you will need to reduce the flour amount by 1/4 cup and add 1/4 cup tapioca flour to ensure it rises properly when baking.
Ingredients
(Makes 8 servings)
3 1/2 tablespoons butter, melted
2 eggs
2 cups golden brown sugar
1 heaping cup all-purpose flour (or see gluten-free instructions in the post above)
2 teaspoons vanilla sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons ground cardamom
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup milk
1/2 cup walnuts, crushed
+ butter to grease the pan
Directions
Preheat oven to 350°F / 175°C. Grease cake mould with a thin layer of butter and sprinkle the crushed walnuts along the bottom of the mould.
In a small saucepan, melt the butter.
In a mixing bowl, beat the eggs and sugar until they are fluffy.
In a separate mixing bowl combine the dry ingredients. Sift the dry ingredients into the egg mixture and combine. Add the melted butter and milk and continue to stir until combined.
Pour the batter into the greased mould and bake on the lower rack of the oven for 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Remove the cake from the oven and let cool for 30 minutes before removing the cake from the mould. Allow it to continue cooling on a cooling rack until it's time to cut and serve.
Nutritional Information Per Serving:
total calories = 371 | total fat = 11.81g | saturated fat = 4.6g | cholesterol = 65.4mg | sodium = 120.5mg | carbohydrates = 63.93g | dietary fibre = 1.34g | sugars = 50.84g | protein = 5.95g
