This gluten free orange cake is made with a handful of ingredients including almond flour, giving it a beautiful moistness. It’s easy, hearty and delicious and made without any butter or oil!
What’s so good about this gluten free orange cake?
It’s so simple and delicious! I got the recipe from Bread Ahead bakeries live bake alongs. It consists of a handful of ingredients, and besides boiling the oranges, barely any time and effort.
The use of almond flour or almond meal gives it this lovely nutty moistness, as does pureeing the oranges whole. It pairs beautifully with coffee or tea, and serves well as a breakfast cake or as a dessert.
It’s also naturally gluten free without using any gluten free flour, and dairy free too!
Ingredients in the orange cake:
Almond flour or almond meal
Baking powder
Eggs
Caster sugar (you can sub with regular white sugar) Caster sugar is slightly less coarse than regular sugar, and is very commonly used in the UK. Regular white sugar can also be used
Whole oranges, zested before boiling. You’ll later combine the zest with the boiled orange pulp so you retain the zesty freshness of the zest without cooking it away.
How to make orange almond cake:
It’s a very simple process, the only thing that requires a bit of fore thought is the boiling of the oranges.
After zesting, oranges need to be submerged in water and brought to a boil for around 2 hours or maybe even a little longer, until fork tender.
Once boiled, let them cool until you can comfortably handle them, then slice in half and remove any big seeds (which could make the batter bitter). This will be very easy to do!
Blend the oranges, whole, skin and all. You’ll add the zest to the puree, mix and set aside.
In a separate bowl, combine the almond flour and baking powder.
In the bowl of a mixer, whisk together the eggs and sugar until fluffy and light- a sabayon.
Then all that’s left is to combine everything together! The egg sugar mix, the orange mix and the almond flour mix. Do this gently, by folding, so that you retain that lightness of the eggs.
You can scatter some flaked almonds on top, which I recommend because it gives a lovely light crunch.
Making a marmalade glaze:
This was a really nice simple touch that made the cake look so glossy and beautiful, and added some lovely flavor to the top so I really enjoyed the addition of the glaze.
Do know, it’s completely optional. You might instead like to dust the top of the cake with confectioners sugar or leave it plain. It’ll be delicious any way!
To make the glaze, it’s as simple as melting a couple of heaped spoons of marmalade to some water, heating it until the marmalade dissolves and the mixture just comes to a simmer, then that’s it!
You can spread the glaze on the cooled cake with a pastry brush or the back of a tablespoon.
Serving the gluten free cake:
You can serve this as is, like I did (preferably with a hot cup of tea!)
You can also add a dollop of cream for a really rich experience.
Ice cream is another thought!
Storing the cake:
Since it’s such a moist cake, I’d recommend storing in the fridge in an air tight container for up to 4 days- it won’t dry out. You can let the slice come to room temperature before eating if you like, but eaten chilled it’s lovely too.
Gluten Free Orange Cake
Ingredients
- 2 large oranges, zested
- 1 tbsp baking powder 15g
- 300 g almond flour
- 1 1/3 cup caster sugar 280 g
- 6 eggs, room temperature
- handful flaked almonds, optional
For marmalade glaze (optional):
- 2 heaped tbsp marmalade of choice (I used orange) 80 g
- 2 tbsp water 30g
Instructions
- Place the zested oranges (without their zest) in a large saucepan and cover with water until submerged. Place on medium heat and boil for 2-2.5 hours or until oranges are very tender when poked.
- Cool slightly and cut each orange in half so you can remove the pips. Blend the oranges until they turn into a pulp (you could also use the large side of a box grater to do this). Fold in the orange zest, and set aside.
- In a separate bowl, whisk the baking powder thoroughly with the almond flour. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a mixer, add the caster sugar and eggs and whisk on medium speed for 2-3 minutes until light and foamy.
- Add the orange mixture to the egg and sugar mixture and fold gently to combine. Add the almond flour mix to this, and fold to combine.
- Pour into a prepared 9×13 baking pan. Sprinkle with flaked almonds if using, and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool completely.
For the glaze:
- In a sauté pan over medium heat, add the marmalade and the water. Stir until marmalade has melted and let it simmer for a minute or so. That's the glaze! Brush glaze onto cooled cake.
Notes
Gluten Free Orange Cake by everylittlecrumb on Jumprope.
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I absolutely adore baking with almond flour, and this cake was no exception! I love the delicate orange flavour and texture – superb.
Thanks so much Alex!
This cake looks so tasty! I love anything orange! It’s like a taste of sunshine in every bite!
Thank you Taylor!
I’ve been looking for some fun summer dessert recipes to switch up my usual chocolate chip cookie baking. This is PERFECT! Thank you for sharing!
So glad to hear that I hope you try and like it!
The lovely texture of almond flour and marmalade are a perfect match! Yum.
Thanks so much Katherine !