Orange Rose and Pistachio Cake

My lovely neighbour Sharon turned 50 this week and i have used the orange curd i made last week to create her a very special birthday cake. Orange, rose and Pistachio are very traditional flavours  in turkish cuisine but there is no reason why these amazing flavours can not be transfered into a very traditionally british sandwich cake. 

This cake does take a little more care and attention than my other recipes but is completely worth the time! Simply decorated with ground pistachios and crystalised rose petals ( ridiculously simple to make!), it makes a big impression against cream cheese icing with a touch of rose water. 

For the sponge you will need:

400g melted butter

2 whole medium oranges

400g light brown caster sugar

6 eggs

150g ground almonds

350g Self Raising Flour

For the decoration:

250g Full fat cream cheese

250g Mascapone

200g icing sugar

100g pistachio (without their shells)

1 tsp rose water

Rose petals

1 egg white

150g caster sugar

Orange curd ( one you prepared earlier!)

1. First things first, you can't have a beautifully moist and zesty orange cake without fresh oranges. So, place your two oranges in a saucepan of boiling water and boil on the heat for an hour. Make sure the oranges are constantly covered in water so that the oranges are cooked through. Do not peel the oranges, we want all of the lovely zest from the skin! Once cooked leave to cool ready for blitzing later.

2. Combine your melted butter with your brown sugar and then liquidise your two oranges, strain the stringy bits and add to the butter and sugar. Now whisk all of your eggs together until they become creamy and form stiff peaks. With a spatular gently combine the butter mixture to your eggs, do not mix too vigorously as this will beat out the air from your egg mixture.

3. Now weigh out your flour and combine with the ground almonds, once again gently combine to your egg mixture mixing enough to ensure all of your ingredients are mixed in. Now divide your cake mixture into 2 and pour into pre-lined sandwich tins and bake at 170 for 40 minutes or until cooked all the way through. 

4. Once your cakes are cooled slice each sandwich half in half again so you are left with 4 bits of cake in total. Now, place the bottom of the cake on a plate and generously layer with orange curd before placing cake layer number two on top. Cover layer number 2 with orange curd and layer number 3, leaving the top layer bare to cover with cream cheese icing.

5. I have always had a complete nightmare with cream cheese icing as it always goes runny but i promise that if you combine full fat cream cheese with mascapone and icing sugar to taste, your mixture will stay firm. Add one tsp of rose water to give it a little extra flavour which will go perfectly with the orange and pistachio. Put all of your icing on top of your cake and with a knife push the icing across and around the cake until it is evenly covered. 

6. To make crystalised rose petals pick some roses from your garden  or source some from somewhere that grows their roses without any pesticides. Lightly beat your egg white with a fork and then dip each rose petal in the egg whites and then sprinkle with caster sugar and leave on baking parchment to crystalise. This can be done days before you make and decorate your cake but if you want to do it on the day allow 2-3 hours for the rose petals to crystalise.

7. Finally roughly chop your pistachios or blitz in a food processor, make sure they still have lots of texture and are not too finely ground. generously sprinkle these over the top of your cake and arrange your rose petals to make it look like they have delicately fallen on top. Leave in the fridge to firm up but make sure you take it out in time before you serve as nobody likes cold cake!