3 eggs
3 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cup cranberries
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup tangerine juice
1/3 cup lime juice
¼ cup lemon juice
1 1/2 teaspoons Chinese 5 spice powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
zest of one lime
zest of one tangerine
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Grease and flour one bundt pan. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, 5 spice powder and salt in a large bowl. Beat in the juices, oil, zests, vanilla and eggs until well combined. Fold in cranberries. Pour into prepared pan. Bake 55 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Cool 5 minutes on a wire rack, then remove from the pan. Cool completely.
My thoughts:
I hadn’t baked anything in a while, so I decided to make a quick cake. A real benefit of using oil is that you don’t have to wait for butter to soften. I got the idea and with in 15 minutes, including juicing all of the fruit, it was in the oven. I used leftover cranberries that I froze myself back near Thanksgiving, some tangerines that were on the verge of spoiling and a few lemon and lime halves I had in the fridge leftover from other recipes. It is moist, slightly dense and subtly citrus-y. The tangerine juice keeps it from being too tart and cranberries are like little jewels when you cut it. One odd thing about the cake-even though there is no butter in the batter, when it baked it gave off the most buttery aroma imaginable. I can’t quite figure that out.
Now that’s the kind of cake I crave around 4-5pm with a cup of tea. Very nice. Funny about the oil making the cake all buttery tasting. Who knew!
Hi Rachel – what a beautiful and uplifting cake! The addition of the chinese five spice is really intriguing.
Hey, I’m a cook working in nyc. I like your blog, I have one also on blogger: sandwichcult.blogspot.com
nice to meet you!
my eyes bugged out.. now i need help. All i have with a snowed in weekend ahead of me is 2 honey tangerines, 2 lemons, 4 limes and a packet of dried cranberies. please GODDESS of coconut and lime.. help. (btw im hoping to make fajitas so a couple of limes might be used..)
How can i make the recipes while using what i have on hand. Oh.. have bout 1 cup of frozen wild blueberries too
catclan-you could make this cake subbing dried cranberries for the fresh and still have lime juice leftover, I only used 1 1/2 limes. Add the blueberries if you want!
Vanilla is mentioned in the directions but not the ingredients. I guessed 1 teaspoon. Is that correct?
Mine is in the oven right now. It smells wonderful (and the sneak taste of the batter was good too…)! Thank you for sharing this.
Lisa
Lisa: 1 teaspoon is correct, sorry about that, I had been toying with leaving it out and forgot to add it back in.
That looks delicious! I love 5 spice powder but I’d never thought to use it in baking before. very interesting. I’m going to have to make this.
No eggs?? How wonderful!! I work for a vegan woman and never know what to bring in. I am making this tomorrow to take to work on Monday!! Yum, I love citrus and cranberries.
oh duh!! How did I miss those eggs the first time. I reread the recipe and there they were.
My kind of recipe. I’ll try this with gluten-free flour and let you know how I get on.
I would have never thought to make muffins out of my letovers! Those look so yummy – they would be great with bad work coffee that I’m drinking right now.
Thanks for participating!
The Leftover Tuesdays Roundup is now posted!
I made this yesterday and it’s WONDERFUL. I wasn’t sure how my kids would react to it, but they devoured it. It’s really lovely, so thank you for the recipe. In fact, thank you for all of the recipes. You’re incredibly generous to share these with us.
Regina: I am glad you enjoyed it! Thanks so much!
I have just made this cake for my daughter’s 3rd birthday. I’m making a butterfly out of it. I just realised that I ran out of butter and searched for a cake on-line such as this. It has turned out beautifully. Fluffy and golden. Everything I could have hoped for and delicious. Thank you! Your recipe has now made it to Australia!
Have just discovered your blog and am now trying to whittle down my “must bake now” list. I haven’t got a bundt pan (that’s on another list) – could you suggest a suitable sized round springform cake tin, please?
Debs. This recipe is sized for the cake to be made in a bundt pan.
I am not quite sure what you mean by “can you suggest a suitable sized round springform cake tin, please?”. Is that what you want to use? Are you asking if a springform pan is appropriate? I have no idea what size springform pan you have so I have no way of knowing if it would be big enough.
Hi Rachel
Sorry that I didn’t make myself clear. I’ve only got 7″ 8″ and 9″ springform pans – do you think any of these will do, please?
Debs, this recipe makes a lot of cake, I am not sure if even the 9 inch pan would be large enough. It might if the sides are very high. I would see if it holds 10-12 cups, that’s a standard size for bundts.
Thanks Rachel
Think it might be easiest if I go shopping or a bundt pan.
Over here in England we’re not used to using cups for measurements, we call pans tins, and bundt pans aren’t used much. Still, I like a challenge!