Dario Cecchini’s olive oil cake
This recipe, from Judy Zeidler’s “Italy Cooks” cookbook is a delicious non-dairy dessert, and a fitting tribute to Zeidler, the Los Angeles-based cookbook author whom Cecchini considered his second mother.
Ingredients
- ¼ cup ground almonds
- 5 eggs
- 2 cups sugar
- 2 oranges finely chopped (pulp and peel)
- ½ cup olive oil plus 2 tablespoons for top
- 4 cups flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- ½ cup raisins, plumped in Vin Santo to cover (and slightly drained)
- Sugar for garnish
- ½ cup toasted pine nuts
Instructions
- Makes one large round cake.
- Preheat the oven to 375 F.
- Brush a 10- or 12-inch springform pan with olive oil and dust with ground almonds.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the eggs with sugar. Add orange peel and pulp and mix well.
- Slowly add the olive oil alternating with the flour and baking powder and mix until smooth.
- Let rest for 10 minutes, stirring from time to time.
- The oil is light but tends to separate from the batter; mix well. Stir in raisins. Spoon batter into the prepared pan.
- Dust with sugar, drizzle with olive oil and pine nuts. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
