Brown sugar cake with brown sugar cream
Keeping notes: Tightly wrapped, the baked sponge will keep for 2 days. The cream is best made on the day, and once the topping is on the cake, you should serve it straight away.
SERVES
8
PEOPLE
PREP TIME
10
MINUTES
COOKING TIME
35
MINUTES
Ingredients
3 eggs
225g dark brown soft or muscovado sugar
150g plain flour
¾ tsp fine sea salt
1 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp bicarbonate of soda
150g unsalted butter, melted and warm
75g crème fraîche icing sugar, to serve (optional)
For the brown sugar cream
200ml double cream
200g crème fraîche
1 tsp vanilla bean paste or extract
50g dark brown soft or muscovado sugar
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180°C fan.
2. Put the eggs and sugar into the bowl of a stand mixer and whisk on high speed for 5 minutes (or whisk by hand), until light and almost tripled in volume. Sift over the flour, salt and raising agents and whisk on low speed until just combined. Mix together the butter and crème fraîche and, still on low speed, stream down the sides of the bowl and mix until just combined.
3. Transfer the mix to a 23cm round cake tin (bottom and sides lined with parchment paper) and bake for 30–35 minutes, until springy to the touch. Leave to cool completely in the tin on a wire rack.
4. For the cream, put everything into the bowl of a stand mixer and whisk to soft peaks.
5. Remove the cake from the tin and put on a serving plate, dollop the cream on top, sprinkle with icing sugar, if using, and serve.
