Sweet Orange Loaf

“You can mix an amazing variety of cakes in a saucepan, without any bowls or mess.  The cakes have moist textures, and fruit is plump and succulent.  There’s even a sweet bonus – less washing up to do.” 

In the tradition of easy cake recipes, here is a recipe that illustrates my idea of easy cake recipes.  The preparation time is 20 minutes maximun and really lives up to the above quote.

What I also love about this recipe is that you can easily turn it into a Sweet Lemon Loaf by substituting the orange zest with lemon zest.   The taste of orange is very subtle here and if you’d like to play up the orange flavor just add 1 teaspoon of orange extract to the recipe.

It is very important that you line the bottom of your pan with parchment paper as per the recipe.  I cannot tell you how pleased I was to see at the end that not only did I have less to wash up, but I didn’t even have to scrub my pan.  Parchment paper has to be one of the best inventions for bakers.

Once the cake is cooled, you can serve it plain or topped it with cream cheese frosting and sprinkled with mixed glazed peel.

Try it out and share your thoughts.

Recipe: Sweet Orange Loaf

Preparation Time: 20 minutes, Cook Time: 40 minutes

 90g butter, chopped

¾ cup (165g) baker sugar

¾ cup (180ml) milk

1 tablespoon grated orange zest

1 egg

1 ½ cups self raising flour

•  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
• Combine butter, sugar, milk an orange zest in medium saucepan, and stir over low heat without boiling until butter is melted.
• Cool for 10 minutes.
• While the butter mixture is cooling, grease 4 1/2″ x 8 1/2″  loaf pan, cover base with parchment paper. I used the Calphalon one shown below.
• Stir in egg and flour.  Pour mixture in prepared pan.
• Bake for 40 minutes.  Turn on wire rack to cool.