LUCY POTTER shares her recipe for sticky almond cake

MY mother is a wonderful cake-baker, and yet she is not a great fan of cakes. Apart from this one.

Indeed, while neither my mum nor I have a particularly sweet tooth, we are both obsessed with this super sticky almondy cake.

This is partly due to our shared penchant for moist cakes that double-up as desserts but mainly due to our mutual passion for anything nutty.

This cake is therefore a winner on all counts. The cake batter uses predominantly ground almonds and the extra layer of marzipan in the centre adds, not only an intense almondy flavour, but an extra dimension of molten stickiness.

A rich, nutty, gooey delight, this cake is great served as a dessert, preferably with a bowl of raspberries and natural yoghurt, crème fraiche or vanilla ice-cream.

An amaretto coffee chaser wouldn’t go amiss either, if you really want to seal the almondy deal.

Sticky almond cake

Ingredients:

225g butter
225g caster sugar
4 eggs, beaten
50g white plain flour
175g ground almonds
½ tsp almond essence
350g white marzipan
Icing sugar for dusting
Toasted flaked almonds to decorate

Method:

1. Grease and line a 21-23cm base-measurement, spring-release cake tin.

2. Cream together the butter and sugar until very pale. Gradually beat in the eggs, adding a little flour if mixture curdles. Stir in remaining flour then gently fold in the ground almonds and essence.

3. Roll out the marzipan slightly larger than the cake tin. Using the tin as a template, cut marzipan into a circle.

4. Place half the cake mixture in the cake tin. Top with the marzipan, then finish with the remaining cake mixture.

5. Bake at 180C (350F) gas mark 4 for about 60-75 minutes, or until firm to the touch, covering lightly with foil if necessary.

6. Cool for five minutes in the tin, then remove from the tin and cool on a rack. Wrap in foil and store for at least one day.

7. Serve! But dust with icing sugar and scatter toasted flaked almonds on top first.