When I was a child, my mum used to make a fantastic cake that I called "Cup of Tea Cake" because it's made with a cup of tea. When I visited her in London last weekend she had made one of those cakes for a tea party she hosted. She sent me the recipe and I made one for myself this morning. Frankly, I'm quite impressed with the cake and will be sharing it at work tomorrow.
The recipe is very simple and unlike most baking, the exact amounts aren't terribly important. It's the proportions that count. So the cups you use just need to be the same size, they don't all need to be eight US fl. oz.
You will need:
- 1 cup of brown sugar
- 1 cup of dried fruit, like raisins
- 1 cup of good, strong tea
- 2 cups of self raising flour
- 1 egg
- 1 pinch of nutmeg
Start off by making a good strong cup of tea. Ideally, use a really good tea and make it stronger than you would normally drink it. Remember, it's going to be mixed up with a lot of other ingredients, so you don't want the flavour to get lost.
Soak the dried fruit and sugar in the cup of tea overnight. In the morning, pre-heat the oven to 325°F (435K if you use
metric) mix the flour, egg and nutmeg into the soaked fruit. Grease a bread shaped dish, fill it with the batter and pop it in the oven.
I baked the cake for about 1¼ hours and then turned off the heat and left it in the oven for another few minutes. Every oven I've ever used has cooked at a different speed from all the others, so I expect the time it take to cook will vary. Especially if you use an
Aga.
Serve the cake with a cup of tea. It's really great if you spread some butter on it, too.
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