Great British Bake Off Technical Bake (5.1)

Yes, yes, I know this is late. However, I have no television, so an arrangement has been made - I will watch the bake off on catch-up at someone else's house, and in return, I provide the technical bake of the week.

 Last week, then, was cake week. Mary Berry's cherry cake.

Sadly I don't own a large enough savarin mould or bundt tin. So it had to go in a loaf tin.

And, as it turned out, I had to flake my own almonds. (Easy but time consuming, how to here )

It was a little drier and darker than I would have liked. My oven was on the blink a bit, and a bit too hot I think. However, it went down rather well.

Recipe
From BBC Food
Equipment and preparation: for this recipe you will need a 23cm/9in savarin mould or a bundt tin
(alternatively use a 20cm/8in round cake tin).

Ingredients:
        175g/6oz softened butter, plus extra for greasing
        175g/6oz caster sugar
        1 lemon, finely grated zest only
        3 large free-range eggs
        200g/7oz glacé cherries
        225g/8oz self-raising flour
        50g/1¾oz ground almonds

For the decoration
        175g/6oz icing sugar
        1 lemon, juice only
        15g/½oz flaked almonds, toasted
        5 glacé cherries (taken from the 200g), quartered

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease a 23cm/9in bundt tin or savarin mould with butter. (Two smallish loaf tins also work)
2. Cut the cherries into quarters. Set aside five of the quartered cherries for the decoration. Put the rest of the quartered cherries in a sieve and rinse under running water. Drain well, then dry thoroughly on kitchen paper and toss in two tablespoons of the flour.
3. Measure all the remaining ingredients into a large bowl and beat well for two minutes to mix thoroughly. (I actually did this the traditional way, and creamed butter and sugar, added eggs, then flour, no idea if it made any difference.) Lightly fold in the cherries. Turn into the prepared tin.
4. Bake in the preheated oven for 35-40 minutes until well risen, golden-brown and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes then turn out and cool on a wire rack.
5. For the icing, mix the icing sugar together with the lemon juice to a thick paste. Drizzle over the cooled cake using the back of a spoon (or pipe it like most of the contestants) sprinkle over the toasted almonds and reserved cherries.

Right, time to work on my florentines!