BM #110 : Week 2, Day 3
Theme : Middle Eastern recipes

I was looking for Middle Eastern cookery books at the library and I came across Tahini and Turmeric , a vegan take on Middle Eastern classics. I was happy as vegetarian options in that cuisine are far lesser than non vegetarian ones. So for the third day here, the turmeric cake recipe is adapted from the book.

I used regular milk for this recipe so it’s not vegan, but any non dairy milk will make it vegan. I added a 1/4 cup extra sugar to make it a little more sweeter.

Straight out of the oven, the turmeric flavor in the cake was too prominent but by the next day, the flavor had settled down and it was a lot less mild. I liked that version better. So it’s a good idea to bake this cake a day ahead for the flavors to mingle.

The book mentions that self rising flour is better to use than a combination of plain flour and baking powder. Sometimes baking powder and turmeric together produces red color spots than an all yellow cake. But I didn’t run into that problem, the color turned out good without any reddish patches.

Read on for the recipe.

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon tahini or oil for greasing the pan
• 1.5 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 cups unsweetened shredded coconut
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon ground turmeric
• Pinch of salt
• 3/4 cups milk
• 1/2 cup neutral oil (I used canola)
• Some shelled pistachios or almonds for garnishing

Method:

1. Heat the oven to 350 F.
2. Grease an 8” square pan with a thin layer of tahini paste or a neutral oil.
3. In a large mixing bowl, add the flour, baking powder, shredded coconut, sugar, turmeric and salt.
4. In a medium bowl, whisk the milk, oil and add it to the dry ingredients. Mix well using a silicon spatula until you get a homogeneous mixture. The batter will be thick and lumpy because of the coconut.
5. Transfer the batter to the prepared pan and top with the nuts. Bake for about 25-30 minutes until a skewer inserted in the middle of the cake comes free of crumbs.
6. Take out of the oven and once the cake is cooled down, cut into squares and serve.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing this Week.