Hazelnut, Lemon and Elderflower Cake

Although I didn't pay much attention to the recent Royal Wedding, I must have been subconsciously influenced by the talk of a lemon and elderflower wedding cake, as I suddenly felt that that was the cake I really I wanted to eat.

Having decided which recipe to use, I realised that I didn't have any ground almonds, so used hazelnuts instead. I love using ground hazelnuts in cakes, as they actually add flavour, as well as keeping the cake moist - so often the flavour of almonds is lost, unless you are using a lot, or add almond extract too.

I chose to adapt this BBC Good Food recipe for a Lighter Lemon Drizzle Cake, as it is a reduced fat recipe, and uses oil instead of butter. I've always found it reliable, producing a light, moist cake with a good crumb texture. As I've mentioned, I used ground hazelnuts instead of almonds, and also used sunflower oil instead of rapeseed, as that's what I always have available. Instead of a lemon drizzle, I reduced 150mls of elderflower cordial by half, and drizzled that over the cooked cake, while still hot, then sprinkled the cake lightly with caster sugar.

This was a subtly flavoured cake - none of the three flavours dominated, although I would have liked to taste more of the elderflower; I think I was just unlucky that the brand of elderflower cordial that I bought was very delicate. Despite that, it was a very good cake for a warm spring weekend.