Blood Orange Olive Oil Cake

If you've spent any time in the foodie channels of the internet in the last few weeks, you've no doubt seen recipes for blood oranges. These cute little guys, with a reddish hue to the rind and dark red juice, have found themselves in margaritas, scones, and salads. When I finally got my hands on some, the options were endless!

So, instead of going the healthy route - I made cake.

And not just any cake! Olive oil cake. So it's sorta healthy, right? 

First, you need to zest your oranges. 

Toss in a cup of sugar and rub it into the zest with your fingers.

Next, supreme 3 of those oranges. Beautiful! (don't eat too many of them)

And by supreme, I mean cut out the little segments by cutting off the skin and running your blade along the membranes on either side. Like this:

Don't forget to pull out the seeds! Or that cake might be a little crunchier than expected.

For the other 2 oranges, slice and juice. My hands were only slightly stained after all the orange work. And I managed to get to the juice squirts that hit the walls quickly enough that they didn't stain at all. Yay!

Toss the sugar into the juice, add the eggs, and a bit of vanilla. Whisk!

Such a pretty pink.

Sift in the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Then add the olive oil, in small doses.

I know it looks scary. Remember, there's no butter or other oil. It's all this. Just keep stirring, it mixes in eventually!

Finally, toss in the orange segments and dump into the greased pan.

Golden brown and beautiful. Round cakes just look classy to me. I think if I was a baked good, I'd be a round cake. A lot like this one. 

I wanted to wait for Mr. S to come home to cut into it. You have no idea how hard that was!

Blood Orange Olive Oil Cake

Adapted from Leite's Culinaria 

5 small blood oranges (and maybe 5 more for topping at the end)

1 cup sugar 

Around 1/3 c sour cream 

3 eggs 

1 tsp vanilla

2 scant cups flour 

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 

1/4 teaspoon baking soda 

1/4 teaspoon salt 

2/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease a 9" round cake pan.

Zest all the oranges. In a large bowl, combine the sugar to the zest. Rub it together with your fingers until incorporated. 

Supreme 3 oranges, set aside.

Juice 2 oranges. You should get just over 1/4 c of juice. Add sour cream until there's 3/4 c of liquid. Pour into large bowl and whisk together. Add sugar, eggs, and vanilla, mixing after each addition.

Load a sifter with the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Sift the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Whisk to incorporate. Fold in the olive oil, a little at a time. Break up the orange segments into little pieces, add to the batter and gently mix in. 

Pour batter into the greased pan. Bake for 55 minutes. When removed from oven, let cool 5 minutes. Then pop it out of the pan. 

While the cake is delicious by itself (and could possibly be considered a breakfast food), I topped mine with a mixture of yogurt and clementine simple syrup. You could do yogurt and honey, or whipped cream. Then add more supremes of oranges, and it's delightful!

I sent Mr. S to work with it today. I bet it doesn't last long.