Italian Pine Nut Cake

Makes 1 9-inch cake Serves 10 to 12

This cake is dense, sweet and moist, almost like a blondie, but far more elegant and rich due to the pine nuts.

Ingredients

• 2/3 cup granulated sugar
• 2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 egg white
• ½ cup extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tsp finely grated lemon zest
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
• ½ tsp salt
• 1/3 cup lightly toasted pine nuts*
• ¼ cup untoasted pine nuts
• icing sugar, for dusting

Method

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F. Grease a 9-inch springform pan and line the bottom with parchment paper.
• Whip the granulated sugar, brown sugar, eggs and egg white by hand or in a mixer fitted with the whip attachment until pale and doubled in volume. Whisk in the oil, lemon zest and vanilla.
• In a separate bowl, sift the flour and salt. Add this to the egg mixture and stir just until blended. Stir in the toasted pine nuts and scrape the batter into the prepared pam. Sprinkle the top of the cake with the untoasted pine nuts and bake for about 40 minutes, until the top of the cake is a rich golden brown, with slightly darker golden edges. Cool the cake in the pan before turning out to serve.

* To toast pine nuts, spread them on a parchment-lined baking tray and bake them for 10 minutes in a 350 °F oven. Cool before using.