Recipe of the week: Syrian turmeric cake
Turmeric cake, or sfouf, may sound unusual – and it is – but this exotic flour-free cake will be the talk of any dinner party, say Itab Azzam and Dina Mousawi, The spicy aromatic flavours combined with the almonds make a delicious moist cake that lasts fo
Serves 6-8 250g ground almonds 175g fine semolina 1½ tsp baking powder 2 tsp turmeric 1 tsp aniseed, crushed 1 tsp ground cinnamon 1 tsp nigella seeds 300g butter, at room temperature 200g sugar 3 eggs, at room temperature icing sugar, to garnish handful of broken pistachios, to garnish For the sugar syrup: 80g sugar juice of 1 lemon
• Preheat the oven to 160°C. Line a round 23cm springform tin with baking paper. • Mix the ground almonds, semolina, baking powder, turmeric, aniseed, cinnamon and nigella seeds together in a large bowl. • Beat the butter and sugar together until the mixture is pale and fluffy. A food processor works perfectly well for this. Add the eggs, one at a time, incorporating well. If it starts to curdle or looks too runny, simply add a spoonful of the dry ingredients. • Fold the dry ingredients into the creamed butter, sugar and egg, then pour the mixture into the springform tin and level the surface with a spatula. Bake for around 40 minutes,
or until a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean. • While the cake is in the oven, make the sugar syrup. Put the sugar, lemon juice and 80ml water in a pan and simmer until the sugar dissolves. The longer you simmer it, the thicker the syrup will become. Ten minutes should be about right. • Take the cake out of the oven and insert a skewer around the edges, then, while still warm, pour the syrup all over so that it seeps into the cake itself. • Leave to cool, then remove from the tin. Sprinkle the cake with the icing sugar and pistachios, and serve.
Taken from Syria: Recipes from Home by Itab Azzam and Dina Mousawi, published by Trapeze at £25. To buy from The Week Bookshop for £22, call 020-3176 3835 or visit www.theweek.co.uk/bookshop.