) Genoa cake (Supermarket own-brand with few cherries) | |||||||
| Type | Fruit cake | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Place of origin | Italy | ||||||
| Region or state | Genoa | ||||||
| Main ingredients | Sultanas/raisins, Currants, Glacé cherries, Flour, Eggs, Butter, Sugar | ||||||
| 340 kcal (1424 kJ)[1] | |||||||
| |||||||
Genoa cake (also simply Genoa[2]) is a fruit cake consisting of sultanas, currants or raisins, glacé cherries, almonds, and candied orange peel or essence, cooked in a batter of flour, eggs, butter and sugar.[3] [1]
Origins
Although the name Genoa cake is mainly used in the UK, where recipes for it have been around since the 19th century,[4] it is a variant of the Pandolce cake which originated in 16th century Genoa as a Christmas cake. Unlike Genoa cake, traditional Pandolce includes pine nuts as a major ingredient and uses yeast as its raising agent, which requires several hours to rise, like bread.[5] This original form is now known as Pandolce alto, whilst a simpler variant which uses baking powder is known as Pandolce basso and is essentially the same as the Genoa cake sold in the UK, with a moist but crumbly texture.[6][7]
The term Genoa cake is also sometimes used to refer to two other Genoa-related cakes, neither of which are fruit cakes: Génoise cake, a light sponge cake,[8] and Pain de Gênes (Genoa bread), a dense almond cake.[9]
See also
- Génoise cake (Italian sponge cake)
- Pain de Gênes (ground almond cake)
References
- ^ a b Ingredients and nutritional analysis of commercially made Genoa Cake at Tesco supermarket
- ^ Oxford Dictionaries
- ^ Genoa Cake recipe BBC Good Food Magazine
- ^ Recipe 154 in The Bread Biscuit Bakers and Sugar-Boiler's Assistant by Robert Wells (London, 1890)[1]
- ^ Gourmet Liguria
- ^ Pandolce Basso Genovese Archived 2013-10-15 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Pandolce Christmas cake
- ^ Gourmet Britain Genoa cake recipe
- ^ Cook's Info: Genoa Cake