Mandarin, Polenta and Macadamia Cake

The whole pack are off to visit Carla and her little one tomorrow so I thought I would make a cake. I was looking for something no fuss and would travel well so I decided to make this Mandarin, Polenta and Macadamia Cake from the Australian Womens Weekly Bake cookbook. Before you begin you need to cover four small mandarins with cold water in a saucepan and bring them to a boil. Repeat this another two times before leaving them to cool to room temperature. Then take a large mixing bowl and add 1 cup of polenta, 2 cups of coarsely ground macadamia nuts and one teaspoon of baking powder.

In a smaller bowl whip 250g room temperature butter, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract and 1 cup of caster sugar until light and fluffy. Then add three eggs, one at a time.

Take your small bowl of cream and eggs and combine them with the dry mixture. At this point you are ready to preheat your oven to 170°C/150°C for a fan forced oven as it will take you a little while to prepare the mandarins. Peel your cooled mandarins, blitz them with a stick blender, strain the juice and carefully remove the seeds before adding the pulp to the cake mixture.

Here is a photo of the completed batter in a lined and grease 23cm springform pan. I then cook the cake for a little over an hour. There is some variance depending on how juicy your mandarins are.

Here is the finished product with a dusting of icing sugar. I can only hope it tastes as good as it smells!