This cake is Italian American in origin and it’s super moist thanks to the courgettes and the olive oil. Its packed with spices, is dairy free and has a tangy lemon icing. I tweaked it to be a bit healthier with whole meal spelt flour, and added poppy seeds to the icing. It’s perfect with a coffee for breakfast or at teatime… but would make a great birthday cake too.

Recipe for 12 slices

Ingredients 

1 cup of ground almonds
2 cups of whole meal spelt flour, or plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
1 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon of fresh ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon of ground ginger
2 teaspoons of cinnamon
3 large eggs (or egg replacer from health food shops or online)
1  and 3/4 cups of golden caster sugar
1 cup of mild olive oil or flavourless oil like macadamia nut oil
2 teaspoons of vanilla paste or extract
2 and 1/2 cups of finely grated courgettes( I do this in my food processor with the fine grating attachment, but a fine grater works perfectly)
a bundt tin or loaf tin

For the icing

2 tablespoons of Lemon juice and its zest
3/4 cup of icing sugar
1 teaspoon of poppy seeds

How

Pre heat the oven to 180c (350f).
Prepare an 8” approximately bundt tin by spraying with cake release spray(you can get it on Amazon and it’s fantastic) or lightly oil it.
In a bowl, add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg, then put to one side.
In a large bowl, with an electric whisk, beat the eggs, sugar and olive oil for a few minutes till fluffy and lighter in colour. Whisk in the dry ingredients and mix together for half a minute.  Stir in the ground almonds and the grated courgette and stir through till everything is mixed together.
Tip the mixture into the baking tin and bake for 35 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean from the centre.
Leave to cool and remove from the tin then make the icing by mixing the lemon juice, zest and icing sugar until creamy. Spoon over the cake and sprinkle with the poppy seeds.

Note: I baked this today in a Nordicware Magnolia bundt pan which is nearly 10” wide and it was perfect, they have a really helpful video on their website on how to bake a bundt cake successfully too.

I shop at:
Waitrose
Sainsbury’s
Tesco
Lidl