Apple and Ricotta Ciambella

A ciambella is an Italian ring-shaped cake with lots of regional variations, so my research tells me. It’s a breakfast or afternoon tea cake, but it will double nicely as a dessert cake too. I’d never made one before – it looks wonderful so inviting – so I thought I’d give it a go.

If you’re looking for a simple cake that looks fancy and tastes delicious this is for you! The recipe is adapted from a couple of great recipes from Silvia Colloca and SBS Food .

Here’s the recipe.

Ingredients

2 large apples

Finely grated zest and juice of 1 lemon + extra juice for sprinkling

3 eggs

180g raw sugar

50g extra virgin olive oil

170g ricotta

200 g self-raising flour

75g almond meal

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 tsp vanilla paste or extract

1 tablespoon orange liqueur

1 tablespoon golden syrup, warmed,for glazing

Method

Preheat the oven to 170 degrees C. Non fan forced seems to work better for this cake.

Butter and flour any Bundt tin – a plain ring tin or something more fancy!

Peel the apples. Chop one of the apples into small chunks, and the other into thin slices. Sprinkle with a little lemon juice to prevent from browning.

Place the eggs and caster sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer, and using the whisk attachment, whisk on low speed increasing to medium until the mixture is pale and creamy.

Add the olive oil and ricotta and whisk on a low speed just until the mixture is smooth and free from lumps.

Sift the flour, almond meal and baking powder and fold into the batter.

Stir in the lemon zest and juice, vanilla, orange liqueur and the chopped apple.

Pour the batter into the Bundt tin. Place the apple slices around the ring, overlapping each other.

Put the cake into the oven and bake for about 35–45 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Let the cake cool completely in the tin, then loosen the cake around the edges with a palette knife.

Carefully turn the cake out onto a plate and then even more carefully turn the cake the right way up.

Brush the top of the cake and apple slices with the warmed golden syrup.

Serve on its own or pretty much with whatever you fancy – I served it as a dessert with a strawberry compote and plenty of lemon curd!