Torta Paradiso – Paradise Cake

I have been watching a lot of Youtube videos recently and came across Torta Paradiso which is an Italian cake.  With my in depth knowledge of Italian, (not really) I was able to translate the name to Paradise Cake.  This cake is flavoured with the zest of orange and lemon and will some vanilla bean seeds too.  The cake looked great in the videos I watched so I decided that I would make it too.

It is actually very easy to make, but with a few steps in the mixing.  Then it is just a simple thing to bake it and let it cool before covering with some icing sugar/powdered sugar.

I did see some recipes where the cake was sliced in half to make two layers and then filled with some whipped cream. That would be very nice too but for mine I just wanted the simple cake, so I could check the flavour without other flavours and textures being present.

Mine turned out very well indeed, the cake was moist and had a wonderful texture and the flavour of the zest and vanilla really came through well.  This is a cake I will be making again, for sure. 

                                           Torta Paradiso – Paradise Cake Video
Ingredients:

• 170g(3/4 cup) softened butter
• 170g(1 3/8 cups) icing sugar, plus more for sifting on top
• 40g(3 tbsp) granulated or caster sugar
• 100g (3 1/2 oz)cake/pastry flour(plain flour will be fine too)
• 70g(2 1/2 oz)corn flour(the original recipes use potato starch)
• 1 tsp(4g) baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 80g egg yolks(I used 4 yolks and made up the weight with egg white)
• 2 medium eggs(large in USA)
• zest of one orange
• zest of one lemon
• seeds from one vanilla bean.

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 170C/340F.
2. Grease a 9 inch/23 cm springform pan and flour it too, discarding excess flour, so that the flour coats the entire interior of the pan.
3. Place the butter, salt and icing sugar into a bowl and beat to a creamy consistency(I used my hand mixer).
4. Add the vanilla seeds, orange and lemon zests and beat to combine.
5. Add the egg yolks(one at a time) and beat to combine to a soft, creamy consistency.
6. In a separate bowl place the whole eggs and the granulated sugar and whisk(having washed the beaters if using a hand mixer) until the eggs are thick and creamy and have increased in volume.
7. Mix the flour, baking powder and corn flour together, and sift into a bowl.
8. Add half the egg mixture to the creamed butter mixture and stir in, adding half flour mixture.
9. Gently fold the eggs and flour into the mixture.
10. Add the remaining egg mixture and fold in.
11. Add the remaining flour mixture and fold in.
12. Put the batter into the cake pan and spread it evenly across the base.
13. Bake in the oven for 45 to 50 minutes, covering the top with aluminium foil after 30 minutes if the cake seems to be browning too quickly.  Test with a skewer to ensure the centre is cooked.
14. Remove from the over and cool for 20 minutes then remove the springform side and tip the cake upside down onto a plate and leave to cool completely.
15. Dust the top with a fairly thick coating of icing sugar and serve.