Raspberry Torte – Jo Wheatley A Passion for Baking

I have to confess I didn’t own Jo Wheatley’s cookbook A Passion for Baking when I started my challenge to make better use of my many cookbooks. Jo was the winner of the second series of Great British Bake-Off (GBBO). If you like baking and haven’t yet discovered the programme you must, it is compulsive viewing for bakers.

We had a glut of raspberries to use so I’ve been going through books to find raspberry recipes. There are less cakes with raspberries in than you might think and a number like Mary Berry’s Raspberry Roulade looked more suitable for a rainy weekend baking session than a quick bake late on a weekday evening.

This cooked a bit quicker than I was expecting so browned a little too much. I think it would look nicer in a round tin and you need firm raspberries to push into the batter.

It’s a nice cake that is almost like shortbread. Raspberries and Almonds go well together.

Ingredients

• 150g (5oz) self-raising flour
• 150g (5oz) unsalted butter, softened
• 150g (5oz) caster sugar
• 150g (5oz) ground almonds
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 150g (5oz) fresh raspberries, plus extra to serve
• icing sugar to dust

Instructions

1. You will need a 23cm (9in) cake tin, buttered and the base lined with a disc of buttered baking parchment. I don’t have a 23cm round cake tin so I looked up the equivalent square tin (20cm) and used that instead.
2. Preheat the oven to 180C/160C fan/350F/gas 4.
3. Tip the flour, soft butter, sugar, ground almonds and eggs into a bowl and beat together until pale, light and fluffy.
4. Spoon the cake mixture into the prepared tin and spread level with a palette knife. Push the raspberries, pointy sides up, into the batter.
5. Bake on the middle shelf of the preheated oven for about 1 hour, checking the cake after 45 minutes (ovens vary, so it may be ready) and covering it loosely with foil once it has browned to prevent the top colouring too much.
6. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes and then transfer the torte to a cooling rack until cold. Scatter with extra raspberries and dust with icing sugar to serve.

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