It’s time for The Home Bakers again! This is supposed to be a marionberry (a type of blackberry) filled cake made with ground hazelnut, chosen by Janis of The Kitchen is my Shrink.

Because blackberries are crazily expensive here, I substituted them with blueberries and decided to swap the hazelnut for almond as I already have ground almond on hand.

This cake reminds me a lot of the apple, walnut and blueberry mosaic muffins that we baked earlier – plenty of fruits in very little batter with a nice hint of cinnamon. The sugar topping, though I found it a bit excessive, creates a slightly crispy crust as it caramelizes in the oven, contrasting the soft and moist cake. This is definitely one good cake to serve during tea!

I’ve included some of my baking notes at the end of the post, here are the step-by-step photos first!

1) Toast the almond meal in a 160 degrees Celsius oven for 5 minutes until lightly browned and fragrant.	2) When the almond meal has cooled completely, mix it with flour, baking powder and cinnamon. Set aside.
3) Cream butter, brown sugar and caster sugar until light and creamy.	4) Beat in egg and vanilla extract / vanilla paste.
5) Fold in the flour mixture.	6) Toss the blueberries with a little flour and fold it in. Transfer the batter into a lined tin.
7) Combine brown sugar, cinnamon and almond flakes in a small bowl.	8) Sprinkle the sugar-nuts mixture evenly over the batter and bake away!

The cake would have been even more delicious with ice cream! Pity I didn’t have the time to style the shot!

Do head over here to see other baker’s take on the bake!

And here’s the recipe!

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Blueberry Almond Cake (makes a 5-inch cake)

adapted from Coffee Cakes by Lou Seibert Pappas

Here are the ingredients I used for the bake:

Batter
2 1/2 tablespoons almond meal / ground almond, toasted and cooled
1 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
45 grams unsalted butter, softened at room temperature (3 tablespoons)
2 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 large egg
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract / paste

Blueberries
2/3 cup blueberries (can be frozen or fresh)
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

Sugar-Nut Topping
2 tablespoons almond flakes
1/2 tablespoon brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

For the full instructions, please head over to Janis (The Kitchen is my Shrink) blog!

Notes:

[1] I tossed the blueberries in flour before adding them into the batter to prevent them from sinking, but since the amount of batter is very little, the blueberries can just be scattered on top of the batter after the batter has been transferred into the baking tin. If you do that, remember to add 1 tablespoon of flour into the batter!

[2] Even though I baked only 1/3 of the recipe and used a small 6-inch round tin, I still had to bake the cake for about 45 minutes before the skewer comes out clean.

[3] I tented the cake halfway with aluminum foil as the top was already very well-browned.

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