Cake heaven

I think I may have gone to cake heaven. It's a Semolina Cake with Berry Compote. I found this little wonder in the Nov/Dec issue of Recipes +, in the Health Bites section of all places. It's listed as being diabetic-friendly, low in fat and low GI. All this in a cake? It turned out beautifully, I loved it so much. You really should try it, so here's the recipe.

Semolina Cake with Berry Compote
From Recipes + magazine, Nov/Dec 2007, p 76

Serves 8
Preparation: 10 min
Cooking: 25 min

80g reduced-fat margarine
80g reduced-fat fresh ricotta
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 tbs finely grated lemon zest
2 eggs
1/2 cup self-raising flour
2/3 cup coarse semolina
1/2 cup almond meal
1 tbs brandy
Berry Compote, to serve (recipe follows)
low-fat yoghurt, to serve

1. Preheat oven to 180°C/160°C fan forced. Grease an 18cm round cake pan, line the base with baking paper.

2. Using an electric mixer, beat margarine with ricotta, sugar and zest until smooth and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition (mixture may look curdled). Sift flour with semolina and almond meak, returning any coarse nuts to the sifted mixture. Fold into egg mixture until well combined. Fold in brandy. Spoon mixture into pan and level the surface.

3. Bake for 25 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer. Cool for 5 minutes in pan, turn out onto a wire rack, turn upright and cool completely. Serve in thin wedges with berry compote and yoghurt.

Berry Compote

Serves 8
Preparation: 2 minutes + 30 minutes to macerate

300g frozen berries
1 1/2 tbs caster sugar
1 tsp finely grated lemon zest
2 tsp brandy (optional)

Place all ingredients in a bowl and mix to combine. Let stand for at least 30 minutes until sugar dissolves. Stir before serving.

Nutrition per serve (with compote) 1369kj; 12g fat (4g saturated); 3g fibre.

I was drawn to this recipe while reading at work today and made a list of things I'd need to buy to make it which included fresh ricotta, semolina and yoghurt. DD took me out to the local Zone Fresh Gourmet Market to pick them out tonight after he played his video game. From my list, the only things they had were the ricotta and some Star chicken stock cubes. They had no semolina, no good yoghurt, no almond meal. Normally they are so good!

Luck was with me though, because I had suspected that I had some semolina at home, but I was pretty sure there wasn't much there. I was right, there wasn't much there. In fact, it was about 1/2 cm less than 2/3 cup I needed. It was okay, I just made up the difference with almond meal.

I used brandy essence in place of real brandy. DD opened the bottle, gave it a sniff and then informed me "it smells like brandy". Duh.

It's a fantastic cake - light and lovely and delicate. I enjoyed it so much. The berry compote isn't bad either. Yum!