Mandarin Orange Cranberry Butter Cake

A moist butter cake using a seasonal ingredient - mandarin orange 🍊. Besides the sweet orange flavour, the cake carries an auspicious golden hue with specks of orange peels and cranberry bits scattered within the fine, moist crumb 😀

As there would be plenty of cookies to be eaten during Chinese New Year period, so I just baked a small cake to compliment 🌸


Yield: one 15x9x5cm cake
Pan size: 17x10x8cm
Baking temperature: 155°C for 30 minutes, 170°C for 5 to 8 minutes

Ingredients:

Using 55g Omega 3&6 eggs
All ingredients in room temperature

75g salted butter, softened but not glossy
60~65g caster sugar*

2 eggs

78g top flour
10g milk powder
2g baking powder, about 1/2 tsp

15g mandarin orange juice

10g rice malt syrup/golden syrup/honey

10g dried cranberry, cut into fine bits
8g mandarin orange peel

* Use 5g less sugar if you prefer a less sweet cake

Directions

1. Extract juice from a mandarin orange. I used a garlic crusher to help me extract the juice.
Remove the whitish layer of the orange peel and chop the orange peel into fine bits. Set aside.

2. Beat eggs in a bowl till frothy. Set aside.

3. Cream softened butter with caster sugar till light and fluffy.

4. Blend in the beaten egg from (2) gradually.

5. Mix top flour, milk powder and baking powder in a bowl before sieving into batter in 3 batches.

 6. Mix mandarin orange juice with rice malt before adding to the batter.

Blend well.

7. Add orange peel to the batter and mix well.

8. Pour about 1/3 of the batter into the cake pan coated with a layer of butter.
Mix the dried cranberry bits with the remaining batter.

Pour the batter into the cake pan.

9. Bake in a preheated oven, at middle rack, at 155°C for 30 minutes, or till an inserted cake tester draws out clean. Increase the oven temperature to 170°C for 5 to 8 minutes, just to give the cake a nice golden crust.

10. Remove the cake from the oven and let it cool down for about 5~10 minutes in the pan.

Invert out the cake and let it cool over a wire rack.

Cover it with cling wrap to seal in the moisture.

11. Let the cake cool down before cutting. Enjoy 

Wishing you a happy and prosperous Chinese New Year 2018