Sunshine on a Plate: Orange Marmalade Cake

This is one of my favourite recipes for  muffins. But I usually make muffins as gifts. Since we weren’t visiting anyone, I decided to make it as a cake – perfect accompaniment to tea and coffee. I like having some cake/ cookies handy for surprise visitors!

I can’t remember where the original recipe is from but I found it last Diwali amidst my various scraps of papers with scribbled recipes, and have used it quite a few times since then! The subtle citrus flavour and the rind peices from the marmalade give me quite a kick!

Here’s what I used:

4 cups flour
1/2 cup suger
2 tbsp baking powder
1/2 cup butter
2 cups orange marmalade
1 cup orange juice
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 eggs

For the Topping:

3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1tsp nutmeg
3 tbsp melted butter
1/4 tsp salt
5-6 tbsp oats (you can also use wheatgerm… something to add a slight crunch)

Here’s how I made it:

I pre-heated the oven to 150 C. Then I sifted the flour and baking powder together and placed them in a mixing bowl.

Then I added the butter to the bowl…

Then, using my pastry cutter (you can even do it with your fingers), I cut into the mixture till it was slightly crumbly. It won’t look like a fruit crumble or pastry crumble mix because the butter:flour ratio isn’t correct for that!

Then I measured out the marmalade and vanilla…

And the orange juice…

Then I mixed the juice, vanilla essence and marmalade in a bowl… Mine mixed easily cos I just bought the bottle and marmalade was at room temperature. If you pulled yours out of the fridge, then you might need to warm it for 15-30 secs in the microwave…

I cracked the eggas into the flour-butter mixture…

Then poured the marmalade mixture into it…

Then I beat it until just well combined… No overbeating…

For the topping, I placed all the dry ingredients on a plate and mixed them up well… This is important else the salt won’t be well distributed and that will screw up the sweet & salt balance of the topping…

Then I drizzled the melted butter on it…

Then I combined it well with my fingers…

I transfered the cake batter into the prepared pan (9″ x 13″ rectangular one) – lined with butter paper…

I sprinkled the topping over the batter, evenly, and then popped it in the oven for about 35 minutes. Allowing it to cool, I transferred it on a tray and cut it up into squares, and voila!!

Sunshine on a plate!! Perfect accompaniment for tea!!

If you make these as muffins (which are awesome for breakfast by the way), this batter will make 24 muffins and needs only about 20-22 minutes of baking per batch.