Tunis cake anyone?

marmiterulesok

sharalee99 wrote: »

I emailed United Biscuits (They took over this part of McVities apparently)
and they have said it was a marketing decision, but they emailed me a recipe. here it is!

Tunis Cake


3 oz Ground Almond
6 oz Butter
6 oz Castor Sugar
3 standard eggs (size ¾)
Grated rind of a lemon
8 oz Plain Flour
1½ level teaspoon Baking Powder
2 tablespoons Milk

Top
10 oz Plain Chocolate and Marzipan Fruits (Banana/Orange or Pear)
2-3oz Milk Chocolate (optional – see note below)

8” Cake Tin

Cook in the centre of the oven on: Gas mark 3/Electric 325F/160C until golden brown.

Cool before adding top.

Method:

Brush the tin with melted fat and line the base with a circle of greaseproof paper cut to fit. Grease the paper lining.

Beat the butter until soft, add the caster sugar and lemon rind and cream them together until light and fluffy in colour and texture. Beat the eggs together, then add them gradually to the creamed mixture, beating well between each addition.

Using a metal spoon, fold in the ground almonds with the sifted flour and baking powder, as well as enough milk to make a soft dropping consistency. Turn the mixture into the tin and spread it to the sides, leaving the centre slightly hollow so the cake rises evenly during cooking.

Bake the cake on the centre shelf of a moderately cool oven. Gas Mark 3 or 325 degrees F/160 degrees C for about one and half hours or until the cake is golden brown and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Turn on to a wire tray to cool.

The Topping:

Break the plain chocolate into pieces and put into a bowl with 1 tablespoon of water; suspend bowl over a pan of hot water and melt the chocolate.


Wrap a bank of foil around the side of the cake so it extends above the edge of the cake by about half an inch. When the chocolate is ready, carefully pour it on to the top of the cake and ease it to the sides, tap the cake gently to smooth the surface then leave the chocolate to set.

Break the milk chocolate into pieces and put into a bowl suspended over a pan of hot water to melt. Meanwhile, cover a wooden board with foil or greaseproof paper. Pour the chocolate over, smooth out and leave to set. Using a large knife drag the blade over the chocolate to form curls. Arrange the curls around the edge of the cake. Tie a ribbon around the side.

Note: The top may be decorated with butter icing instead of milk chocolate curls. Beat 2oz butter until soft then gradually beat in 4 oz sifted icing sugar. Place in a piping bag with a No. 8 star nozzle attached and pipe a shell edge around the top.

Bit late for Xmas but will see what heppens...If you try it, let me know how it comes out

I've never heard of Tunis cake,but it sounds yummy.I'll certainly be trying this recipe.

skintchick

Just found this thread searching Google for a tunis cake recpie. My dad really wants one as he misses them (personally i don;t like the thick chocolate on top) so I am going to make one. It looks easy enough, just a sponge with almonds and lemon.

So glad this thread exists! Once I know MSE people have tried a recipe I feel soooo much happier using it!!

But...how do you make marzipan fruits or can you buy them?

uolypool

OMG I love Tunis cake. There use to be a small supermarket called P&A near where I live and I remember every year going there with my sister and getting one every Christmas. It was HUGE , ok huge is a slight exaggeration . Am going to have to make the cake using the recipe on here .:)

skintchick

Right. I'll post some pictures tomorrow but I have made the cake following the recipe McVities gave and I have to say itt smelss divine but hasn;t risen much. It is very brown and I had to take it out early as it was done, so probably another time I'll make the oven cooler (I did make it cooler anyway as my fan oven is fierce) and maybe sheild the cake a bit with foil. BUT I'm not sure it's supposed to be very high, even though the shop ones are, as it is made with plain flour.

I don;t have time to test it and make another one, plus we cannot eat that much cake before I go to my mum's on Friday!! But I'll report back after Christmas as to how nice it was. I am going to put the chocolate on it tomorrow and got marzipan fruits from Waitrose. Not sure I'm going to bother with the pink and yellow icing, but I'll see if I have time/inclination.

Mazcabs

I managed to purchase a Tunis cake from Sainsburys today:j, my mum also got one in M&S :Dand a friend said she saw them in Morrisons a couple of days ago so they are about but very limited. :T

Hope this helps someone.

skintchick

Right!

So here it is plain. you can see it has cracked a bit where the oven was probably too hot.


After the chocolate was added. I used Green and Blacks cook's chocolate and added the water the recipe said but it was very thick and hard to spread - I always thought water with choc was a no-no?


And here the choc has set, It is not glossy (I'm sure that's the fault of the water) but does smell divine and looks OK, just a bit rustic!



Hope this helps anyone planning on making one - update to come once it's been tasted!

pinkieminkie

Apologies for dragging up an almost year old thread but I'm on the yearly search for Tunis cake yet again *sigh*. I'm thinking that this year I may have a go at making one, using the McVitees recipe posted in this thread.

I'm hoping that Skintchick will see this and update (those were very helpful piccies and comments on the recipe, BTW)

Did anyone else try this recipe?

manda39

My 80 odd year old nan`s fussing about tunis cake ...
going to give this recipe a go and test it out on her..
she insists there needs to be pink and yellow icing piped on it
1 odf the recipes i found said to trim the top off flat ,

BAGGY

If I recall the pink and yellow butter icing piped on the top was like wax. I still loved it and would prefer that to fruit cake.

slscarborough

Last year my mum found it in Morrisons. I love tunis cake and as a child had this as my birthday cake!!