Wiltshire Whitsun Cake
A moist English gooseberry cake scented with elderflower and dark muscovado sugar, served warm as a pudding with cream. A traditional Wiltshire bake for Whitsun celebrations.
YIELD
1 cakePREP
20 minCOOK
1 hrsREADY
2 hrsThis cake belongs to the English countryside in late spring, when gooseberries are sharp and plump and the elderflower hedgerows are in full bloom.
Tart gooseberries get tossed with fragrant elderflower, then folded into a buttery batter enriched with dark muscovado sugar that gives the crumb a deep, toffee-like sweetness.
Bake it low and slow until the kitchen fills with that unmistakable warm-fruit fragrance, then unmould, dust with crunchy demerara, and serve it still warm with a generous pour of cream.
This is proper English pudding, the kind you’d find at a village Whitsun fête.
Kitchen Tips
- Don’t panic when it sticks. Unlike most cakes, this one won’t pull away from the sides of the tin when done. That’s normal. Let it cool a few minutes before unclipping the spring-form.
- Fresh elderflower is best but dried works in a pinch. Strip the tiny florets from the stalks carefully, as the stalks can taste bitter.
- Rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips rather than melting it. This keeps the crumb tender and light rather than dense.
Ingredients
Directions
Top and tail the gooseberries into a mixing bowl.
Add the finely chopped leaves or the florets of elderflower carefully stripped from the stalk, and stir to mix with the fruit.
Sift the flour and baking powder into a separate bowl.
Cut then rub in the butter. Stir in the muscovado sugar then the lightly beaten eggs.
Finally, stir in the gooseberries and their flavourings.
Grease the base of an 8-inch spring-clip cake tin, line and grease again.
Turn the cake mixture into it and mound it up in the middle.
Bake at 350℉ (180℃). for about 1½ hours.
Unlike most cakes, this one does not come away from the sides of the tin when it is cooked.
Cool for a few minutes before unmoulding.
Sprinkle with demerara sugar and decorate with fresh elder blossom or sweet geranium or melissa leaves, and serve the deliciously moist cake while it is still warm - as a pudding, with plenty of cream.
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