It started with me finding fresh fennel at the market I go to, to shop for vegetables and fresh herbs. I made some rosemary and fennel chicken and the aroma filled up the house leaving everyone pretty happy. This made me want to use fennel in my bakes so there I was trying to make my baking studio smell of fennel. I searched around and came across this recipe, tweaked it just a bit and here it goes. The recipe called for dried fennel seeds so I stuck to that, add as much as you want for flavour. Gods were by my side and I had some fantastic organic aniseed extract which I also added to the mini cakes. It’s gluten free, butter free and if u skip the icing (please don’t) it’s sugar free too. Enjoy!
Fennel and Orange Mini Cakes
Recipe type: Bake
Cuisine: Cake
Ingredients
- 3 cups almond flour
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp baking soda
- 1½ tbsp fennel seeds
- 3 eggs
- ¼ cup whole milk yogurt
- ¼ cup honey
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- Juice from one large orange
- Zest from one orange
- For the orange glaze
- zest from one orange
- Juice from one orange
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- Small splash of milk (probably a tsp)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 160 degrees.
- Butter/flour a mini bundt pan or any fun molds u may have. I found star shaped silicon molds lying around that I wanted to use.
- Toast the fennel seeds in the oven until fragrant, about 4 minutes. Crush with a mortar and pestle or leave whole.
- Combine the almond flour, salt, baking soda and toasted fennel seeds in a bowl.
- Mix the eggs, yogurt, honey, vanilla, orange juice and zest in a different bowl.
- Slowly add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Mix until incorporated but don't over-mix.
- Pour cake mixture into molds filling them ¾. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until golden brown.
- Allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes then let cakes cool on a wire rack before glazing.
- For the glaze
- Whisk together the ingredients for the glaze and spoon on top of the cakes, letting the glaze run down the edges of the cakes.
- Serve with herbal tea, black coffee, or your favorite herbal cocktail.
