This cake is based on Nigella Lawson’s ‘Clementine Cake’ which uses long-simmered clementines, skin-and-all, as the main ingredient of a very moist cake. Here I am using honey tangerines (which are basically a cross between a tangerine and sweet orange), adding cocoa powder, and changing the amounts of sugar and ground almonds.

The cake looks innocuous enough, if you are expecting a chocolate cake. However, if you enjoy the combination of orange and chocolate, you will be more than pleasantly surprised — bittersweet orange flavours hit immediately. The candied tangerine slice on the top is the only hint at what’s to come.

For the cake:

3 honey tangerines, scrubbed
6 eggs
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
200 g finely ground almonds
300 g sugar
40 g cocoa powder

Place the tangerines in a pot of water, bring to boil, and simmer until soft, about 45 minutes. Remove tangerines, and when cool enough to handle, cut them open and remove seeds. Place tangerines in blender or food processor and puree.

Preheat the oven to 350°F. I made individual cakes by placing 3″ ringmolds on a silicone pad, and lining the ringmolds with parchment paper. The parchment paper was about 4″ high which allows for expansion of the cakes.

Mix the tangerine puree with all the other ingredients, making sure there are no lumps. Fill the parchment-lined ringmolds halfway and bake for about 30 minutes until a toothpick comes out cleanly from the centre of the cakes.

If you make one large cake the baking time will increase accordingly.

On top of the cake is some candied tangerine slices which are thin slices laid out on a silicone pad, sprinkled with icing sugar and baked on very low heat. I was in a rush and cooked them at 300°F for about 20 minutes, turning over halfway. Not ideal. Better to go low and slow, but the results were okay.

The kiwi sauce is simply half a cup of sugar and half a cup of water made into a syrup. Cool the syrup. Add the scooped out flesh of 3 ripe kiwis and use your stick blender to finely puree. Cooling the syrup first will result in a greener sauce.

If money is no object or you happen to be in Piedmont, Italy then a salad of asparagus, soft poached egg and shavings of truffle is the way to go. Here I’ve paired the asparagus and egg with some crispy duck confit and shavings of 4 year old Canadian cheddar. Parmigiano-reggiano works well here, as does crispy bacon, pancetta, prosciutto, etc. in place of the duck confit. The asparagus was tossed with some extra virgin olive oil and Anglesey sea salt from Wales (Thanks Mom for bringing that back!). This is a beautiful salt with large, crunchy crystals and a mild taste. If you are able to grill the asparagus after seasoning it, the smoky taste imparted takes this preparation up another level.

Asparagus isn’t in season here in Canada — will have to wait at least a couple of months for that — but there was an amazing sale on some from southern climes at the grocery store. Truffles — I’d better start saving now.

Here is a take on the banana split. Instead of vanilla ice cream I’ve made some sweetened mascarpone:

1 cup mascarpone
1/4 cup icing sugar
1/2 tsp pure almond extract

Mixed well and formed into a quenelle.

You can just see it poking out of the berries and chocolate.

The banana halves were cooked slowly in:

1/3 cup brown sugar
2 T corn syrup
1 T amber rum
1 tsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

The raspberries were mixed with some granulated sugar and left to sit for a while. Makes them sweet and juicy.

In the bottom left is a small pile of crushed pineapple. The chocolate on top is some melted Toblerone bar. Sprinkled around is some homemade granola for a bit more crunch than the Toblerone provides. Drizzle a bit of the banana caramel around the plate. The bonus part to this dessert is that there may be leftover Toblerone (I suggest you buy a large bar), which I am eating as I write this post…

Rolling the chestnut gnocchi off the board. The flour helps as the dough is quite soft. Chestnut flour has no gluten, so it is combined here with all purpose flour. Ricotta also helps bind the gnocchi.