Hazelnut & Raspberry Friands

Friands are a favourite of mine, since I discovered them last year sometime.  Usually made with ground almonds as the main base they are a delicious cake which is very popular in Australia and New Zealand in particular.  For the ones I made today I varied the recipe, using hazelnuts and almonds, to give a slightly different flavour.  I saw a recipe in The Guardian for Hazelnut and Raspberry Friands which I liked.  But I decided to use my basic friand recipe, rather than the one in that article, and just swap out some of the almonds for hazelnuts.  

As I have said before Friands are so easy to make and even if you don’t have a friand tin you can make them using a muffin tin and they are just as good, just a different shape.  

The combination of hazelnut and raspberries worked very well indeed, giving me a really tasty cake that goes so well with a cup of tea or coffee.  These would certainly be a coffee shop favourite I think.

From start to finish you can make these in less than an hour and have a wonderful cake ready to serve to visitors.

Ingredients:

• 185g melted unsalted butter
• 225g icing sugar
• 50g plain flour
• 60g ground almonds
• 90g ground hazelnuts
• 6 medium egg whites(large in USA)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 50g roughly chopped hazelnuts
• 150-200g fresh raspberries

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/180C/400F.
2. Grease a 12 hole friand tin(or a muffin tin)
3. In a large bowl sift the icing sugar and flour and add the ground almonds and ground hazelnuts.
4. Stir to combine.
5. Whisk the egg whites until slightly frothy and add to the dry ingredients, with the vanilla extract.
6. Stir in until all is combined.
7. Add the melted butter and stir in until fully combined.
8. Divid the batter equally into the holes of the friand tin.
9. Drop raspberries onto the top of the batter(I used 3 in each hole).
10. Sprinkle the chopped hazelnuts over the top.
11. Bake in the oven for 20 to 22 minutes, until a skewer poked into the middle of the friands comes out clean.
12. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for a few minutes before transferring the friands to a wire rack too cool completely.