What to bake this weekend: Lemon, blueberry and butter bean cake
By Meg Walker
Invite friends round, or drop a few slices of this butter bean cake at their door, because this loaf was made for sharing.
A citrussy, filling loaf with a wonderfully thick texture that should be brought to the table in slabs. I’m sure it will be wolfed down in one tea sitting, warm from the oven, with a blob of yoghurt or indeed nothing at all. What’s more, it’s gluten- and dairy-free.
Lemon, Blueberry & Butter Bean Cake
Ingredients
- 400g tin butter beans, drained and rinsed
- 50ml olive oil, plus extra for greasing
- 3 medium eggs
- zest and juice of 2 unwaxed lemons
- 100g caster sugar
- 150g ground almonds
- 90g fine polenta
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 200g blueberries
For the syrup
- juice of 1 large lemon
- 50g caster sugar
Method
1 Preheat oven to 180ºC/160ºC fan/gas mark 4. Grease a 900g loaf tin with oil and line it with baking parchment.
2 Put the beans and oil in the bowl of a food processor and blitz to a thick paste. Scrape this into a mixing bowl and stir through the eggs, one at a time, and mix well before adding the lemon zest and juice, sugar, almonds, polenta and baking powder.
3 Pour half the batter into the tin, and scatter with half the blueberries before topping with the remaining batter. Sprinkle the remaining blueberries over the top, lightly pressing them into the batter. Bake for 45 minutes. Meanwhile, make a syrup by warming the lemon juice and sugar with 1 tbsp of water in a small saucepan.
4 As soon as the cake is cooked, remove it from the oven and immediately pour the syrup over it while still in the tin. Don’t worry if it collects in the corners slightly; it will soak into the sponge. Allow to cool a little before removing from the tin. Serve in slices.
Extracted from On the Pulse by Georgina Fuggle (Kenny’s Books, approx €17.95). Photography by Ali Allen.
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