It was by chance that in Oslo I ended up ordering one of the most delicious desserts I’ve had; faced with a fancy Norwegian menu with very few options, we opted for the eloquently named “Kake” ( literally just: “cake”) and hoped for the best… We were presented with two neat slices of an incredibly dense and rather solid sort of lemon cake which, had I read a description of prior to ordering, I probably wouldn’t have been at all tempted by, but it totally worked. It’s dense texture gave that gorgeous sort of satisfaction you get from biting into a thick, gooey brownie, while it’s delicate citrus flavour kept it curiously light. Here that subtle citrus flavour is developed in the form of Earl Grey; really a pretty simple cake flavouring but one which somehow always feels luxurious and adds such elegance to a dish. Though it probably can’t be said that this is a light cake, it’s moist fudginess is fabulous and will hit the spot in times of need for a bit of (classy) indulgence.

Serve it with crème fraîche or Greek yoghurt as a perfect balance to it’s sweetness.

Ingredients:

6 Earl Grey tea bags
200ml boiling water
100g oat flour (oats blitzed in food processor)
220g plain flour
Teaspoon baking powder
0.5 teaspoon bicarbonate soda
0.25 teaspoon salt
100ml olive oil
120g caster sugar
180ml plain yoghurt
100ml milk
0.5 teaspoon loose leaf Earl Grey / contents of tea bag
0.5 teaspoon lemon zest

Method:

Set oven to 180º and grease and line a 9-inch cake tin (Or you could also do a square tin and make them as bars).

Place teabags in a jug and pour over the boiled water to infuse. Leave this around 10 minutes.
In a large mixing bowl, add the oat flour, plain flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt. Stir well with a fork to blend together and break up any lumps.
In a jug, combine the milk and yoghurt with a fork and add in the Earl Grey from the bag, or your loose leaf tea. Let this sit for at least 5 minutes.
In a separate bowl, mix together the oil and the sugar. Gradually add in the milk mixture and mix until just combined.
Slowly add the wet mix to the dry, folding with a spatula. Then add in about 6 tablespoons of the steeped Earl Grey and fold to incorporate, but do not beat or over-mix.
Pour mixture into the tin and bake in oven for around 30 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
Allow to sit in tin 5 minutes before turning onto a cooling rack.