Mandarins, what are you supposed to do with them?
I’ve been addicted to mandarins for years. I can polish off a whole wooden crate in a day. By myself. Thanks to mandarins, I don’t need hyperiforce in winter. The bright orange, sweet-and-sour, juicy little fruit is the very best medicine against a grey-weather depression (and scurvy).
So far, so good, you might think. And yet a thought occurred to me recently. What if, I thought, I didn’t immediately furiously strip this mandarin of its skin and quickly eat it? What then? What can you do with a mandarin in the kitchen, in a – brace yourself – warm application? Then you start Googling, and discover that everyone who has apparently had this not-so-unusual thought before reached the same conclusion: mandarin cake. And quite rightly so. Because how fun is it to cook a few mandarins, peel and all, and then purée them? Exactly. Plus: it’s a super-easy recipe that produces a super-delicious (gluten-free) cake that also keeps well for days. Win-win-win-win.
The most delicious version is the one by cooking goddess Nigella. Bet you’ll always set a few mandarins aside for it from now on?
How to make mandarin cake
- Bring the mandarins to a boil whole in a pan of cold water. Simmer gently for two hours.
- Then drain them and cut them in half so you can remove any seeds.
- Purée the whole lot.
- Preheat the oven to 190 °C (or lower; my oven goes haywire at this temperature)
- Grease a springform pan (Ø 21 cm) and line it with baking paper.
- Beat the eggs, add the sugar, almond flour and baking powder, and mix.
- Stir in the puréed mandarins.
- Pour the batter into the pan and bake for one hour. Make sure the top doesn’t get too dark. If necessary, cover it with a piece of aluminum foil or baking paper after 40 minutes.
- Leave to cool in the springform pan on a wire rack.
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