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.
Ingredients
For the syrup
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.