Almond Cake

This recipe is from America’s Test Kitchen and has quickly become a favorite. Be sure to make the orange crème fraîche sauce to go with it. It’s worth the effort.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 ½ cups blanched sliced or slivered almonds
• ¾ cup (3¾ ounces) all-purpose flour
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon baking powder
• ⅛ teaspoon baking soda
  
• 4 large eggs
• 1 ¼ cups (8¾ ounces) sugar
• 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest (2 lemons total)
• ¾ teaspoon almond extract
• 5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
• ⅓ cup vegetable oil 
  
  Cake Topping:
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• ½ teaspoon grated lemon zest
• 1/3 cup blanched sliced almonds
  
  Orange Crème Fraîche sauce:
• 2 oranges
• 1 cup crème fraîche
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• ⅛ teaspoon salt

INSTRUCTIONS

Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 300 degrees. Grease 9-inch round cake pan and line with parchment paper. Toast almonds until golden brown. Pulse 1½ cups almonds, flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in food processor until almonds are finely ground, 5 to 10 pulses. Transfer almond mixture to bowl.

Process eggs, 1¼ cups sugar, 1 tablespoon lemon zest, and almond extract in now-empty processor until very pale yellow, about 2 minutes. With processor running, add melted butter and oil in steady stream, until incorporated. Add almond mixture and pulse to combine, 4 to 5 pulses. Transfer batter to prepared pan.

Using your fingers, combine remaining 2 tablespoons sugar and 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest in small bowl until fragrant, 5 to 10 seconds. Sprinkle top of cake evenly with remaining 1/3 cup almonds followed by sugar-zest mixture.

Bake until center of cake is set and bounces back when gently pressed and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 55 to 65 minutes, rotating pan after 40 minutes. Let cake cool in pan on wire rack for 15 minutes. Run paring knife around sides of pan. Invert cake onto greased wire rack, discard parchment, and reinvert cake onto second wire rack. Let cake cool, about 2 hours. Cut into wedges and serve with Orange Crème Fraîche sauce if desired. (Store cake in plastic wrap at room temperature for up to 3 days.)

Orange Crème Fraîche sauce:

Remove 1 teaspoon zest from 1 orange. Cut away peel and pith from oranges. Slice between membranes to release segments and cut segments into 1/4-inch pieces. Combine crème fraîche, zest, sugar, and salt in bowl and mix well. Refrigerate for 1 hour. Add in oranges right before serving.

Notes from the Test Kitchen:

The goal when mixing most cake batters is to incorporate a lot of air into the eggs so that the cake will bake up light and tall, and a mixer is usually the best tool to get the job done. For our Best Almond Cake, however, we wanted a flat, level top; just a moderate rise; and a texture that was neither too fluffy nor too dense. Ditching the mixer in favor of a food processor did the trick. Here’s why: When eggs and sugar are whipped in a mixer, the whisk gently unfolds the protein strands in the eggs while incorporating lots of air, producing a foam with a strong network that holds on to that air. The outcome? A tall, well-risen, domed cake. A food processor, with its high rpm and very sharp blade, similarly unravels the eggs’ protein strands and incorporates air, but it also damages some strands along the way. The result is just what we were after: a flatter, slightly denser cake.