Grandma's marmalade cakes

Everyone felt a bit rotten this afternoon, so we made these to cheer ourselves up. You can make lots of small cakes (the mixture made enough for 12), or one large one (in which case a 7 in cake tin, or a loaf tin should do the trick).


You'll need:

8oz plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
4oz butter, softened
4oz sugar
2 eggs
2 tablespoons bitter orange marmalade (I used rhubarb and orange, which was all we had left)
grated rind of one orange

First of all, stick the oven on at 180 degrees C (all Grandma's cakes bake at that temperature). Mix the baking powder into the flour, and rub in the butter (or cheat, and do it in the food processor). Stir in the sugar - I used brown, but white caster sugar would probably produce a lighter result.

Beat the eggs and the marmalade together - this looks absolutely disgusting. Add it to the dry mixture - you should end up with a fairly stiff mix. I loosened mine with a tablespoon of milk. Stir in the orange rind, and you're good to go: spoon the mixture into small fairy-cake sized cases (of the paper or silicon variety), or into a big tin (see above).

Bake in the oven until the tops have gone golden brown, and a little bit crunchy. It'll take about 20 minutes if you do the little cakes (and keep an eye on them - you might have to turn them round, and bring them out a little earlier if your oven's fierce). A big cake will take about 1 1/4 hours.

Allow everything to cool in its tin for a 5 minutes, and then turn out onto a wire rack. They're nicest sprinkled with icing sugar, and would also be good with a blob of creme fraiche and some fruit.