Gooseberry pudding cake with saffron, honey and vanilla custard

Gooseberry pudding cake with saffron, honey and vanilla custard

Summer

This recipe turns a few generous handfuls of gooseberries into a proper pudding. I like to call it a pudding cake. Some of the fruit is gently cooked with saffron and honey to make a bright, fragrant purée which is folded through the batter, while the rest go in whole and collapse into the cake as it bakes. The result is soft, buttery and full of sharp gooseberry flavour with a sticky, fruity layer at the bottom. It’s wonderful served warm, ideally with plenty of proper vanilla custard on the side.

Serves 8

Ingredients

For the cake

  • 175g self raising flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • Pinch sea salt
  • 175g unsalted butter, softened and cut into small pieces
  • 200g golden caster sugar
  • 3 eggs
  • 350g gooseberries
  • Pinch saffron
  • 2 tbsp honey
  • 1 tbsp demerara sugar

For the custard

  • 3 large egg yolks
  • 200ml milk
  • 250ml cream
  • 75g sugar
  • 1 tsp cornflour
  • 1 vanilla pod

Method

Place 150g of the gooseberries in a small pan with the honey, saffron and about ½ tbsp water. Set over a gentle heat and bring to a soft simmer. Cover with a lid and cook, stirring occasionally, until the gooseberries collapse and become pulpy.

Allow the mixture to cool, then pass it through a sieve into a bowl. Chill the purée in the fridge.

Preheat the oven to 160.c fan, 180.c conventional. Grease a 23cm springform cake tin with butter and dust lightly with flour.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together.

In a large bowl beat the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding a heaped teaspoon of the flour mixture with each egg to prevent curdling. Fold in the remaining flour, then gently fold through the chilled gooseberry purée.

Spoon the batter into the prepared tin and spread it evenly. Scatter over the remaining gooseberries and finish with the demerara sugar.

Bake for about 50 minutes to 1 hour until cooked through. The gooseberries will sink into the batter as it bakes, forming a soft, jammy layer at the bottom. Check the cake with a skewer or knife inserted into the centre, it should come out clean.

Leave the cake to sit in the tin for 5–10 minutes before turning out onto a plate.

To make the custard

Split the vanilla pod lengthways and scrape out the seeds. Place both seeds and pod in a saucepan with the milk and cream and bring gently to a simmer.

In a bowl whisk together the egg yolks, sugar and cornflour until smooth. Pour the hot milk and cream over the yolk mixture, whisking continuously.

Return the custard to a clean pan and cook gently over a low heat, stirring constantly, until it thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon.

Strain through a sieve, allow to cool, then cover and refrigerate.

Serve the cake while still warm with plenty of cold custard alongside.

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