Recipe: Chickpea (Besan) Flour Orange Cake
Summary: A moist cake, with a texture like Christmas Pudding. Gluten Free.
Ingredients
- 2 x 275g cans chickpeas, drained
- 4 eggs, beaten
- 1 cup caster sugar
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- grated rind and juice of 1 orange
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius.
- Drain the chickpeas and then rub between your palms to remove the skins.
- Use a potato masher to mash them.
- Stir in the beaten eggs, followed by remaining ingredients.
- Grease and line a 450g loaf tin.
- Pour cake mixture into the tin – the mixture should be dense.
- Bake for 1.5 hours, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- Remove cake from oven and allow it to stand in the tin for 10 minutes.
- Turn cake onto a wire rack, and add icing if desired.
Quick Notes
Icing suggestion – cinnamon sugar.
1/4 cup caster sugar 1 tsp ground cinnamon. Mix together and sprinkle on top.
Variations
This recipe has been taken from a Mexican Cooking cookbook, by Jane Milton. The ingredients list is as her description, however I make the following changes.
Using dried chickpeas and cooking them yourself gives a better flavour. I put a potato in the cooking water to reduce cooking time. (Remove the potato for the cake!)
I recommend reducing the amount of sugar. In the past I have used half the amount, and added extra chickpeas or besan flour to get the right consistency.
Regarding baking time, I’ve made this in a few different ovens and cooking times can vary. Cook until the skewer comes out clean.
