Here’s a great recipe for using up winter-harvested parsnips, with a mascarpone and maple syrup filling. The cake itself is quite crumbly and not too sweet, and the parsnip adds a real twist. You could use light muscavado or raw cane sugar instead; and if you don’t have mixed spice, use a small pinch of ground nutmeg.
Ingredients:
225g salted butter
320g self raising flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp mixed spice
½ tsp ground ginger
1 ½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
200g golden caster sugar
4 eggs
125ml maple syrup
250g grated parsnip
zest of one orange
(optional 50g chopped nuts eg. pecan/walnut.)
Method:
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Preheat oven to 180 degrees and grease two 9″ diameter cake tins.
- Melt butter and allow to cool slightly.
- In a mixing bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, bicarb and spices.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the cooled butter, maple syrup and eggs.
- Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and whisk.
- Fold in the grated parsnip and orange zest (and nuts if using)
- Divide the cake mixture between the 2 cake tins and bake in the oven for 25 mins.
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Check the cake is ready by poking it with a skewer, if it comes out clean the cake is ready. If not, pop it in the oven for a few more minutes.
- Whilst the cake is cooking, make the icing by whisk together the mascarpone and maple syrup with a small pinch of sea salt.
- When the cake is cooled, cover the lower half with the mascarpone mixture and place the top half of the cake on top.
- You can decorate it however you like, we’ve used some grated orange zest but you could use icing sugar or roasted nuts, or if you’re feeling indulgent, make a little extra mascarpone topping