This delicious cake is somewhat similar to the Plum and Hazelnut cake from one of my previous posts. It too has fruit puree added to the batter for the perfectly moist cake and a generous portion of nut (desiccated coconut in this case) that makes it crumbly and flavourful.
The recipe comes from Retro Baking by The Australian Women's Weekly. I slightly changed the recipe and used fresh apricots instead of the dried ones.
Ingredients:
350 g fresh apricots (approx. 7 apricots)
2 tbsp lemon juice
125 g softened butter
150 g light brown sugar
2 eggs (separated)
120 g desiccated coconut
225 g self-raising flour
95 g choc chips or bits
Method:
Preheat oven to 180 C (160 C fan).
Stone and chop half of the apricots, puree them in a food processor or with a blender.
Add lemon juice and just enough water (or milk) to make it one cup (250 ml).
Beat butter and sugar in a bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy.
Beat in egg yolks, until combined.
Stir in the coconut.
Mix in half of the sifted flour and half the apricot mixture.
Stir in the remaining flour and another half of the mixture. Stone and chop the remaining apricots and add them to the batter together with choc chips (I personally prefer scattering them on the top rather than adding them to the cake).
Beat egg whites in a small bowl until soft peaks form.
Fold into cake mixture.
Grease and line the bottom of a deep 20 cm round cake pan.
Spread cake mixture into the pan.
Bake cake about 1 1/4 hours or until a toothpick comes out clean.
You may leave it like this to cool (and sift some icing sugar later on), or scatter the choc bits over the hot cake (I prefer adding them this way).
Remove from the tin and leave to cool completely.
Enjoy with a cup of tea or coffee!
