This orange olive oil cake is just as rich as its buttery peers, more moist, and won't leave you with the same heavy feeling. I make mine lightly spiced and add vanilla along with freshly-sliced oranges.
1tablespoonground cardamomoptional; leave off entirely, add an extra two teaspoons for a stronger cardamom flavor, or replace with other spices if you you prefer those flavors.
1cupgranulated sugar
4large eggs
1/4cupwhole milk
1teaspoonvanilla extract
3/4cupolive oil
1tablespoonorange zestzest of about one large orange
Place butter and brown sugar into the bottom of an 8" round cake pan and place into the oven for about 5 minutes or until the sugar and butter are melted. Swirl the pan to evenly distribute the melted ingredients over the bottom.
Quickly arrange orange slices on the melted butter/sugar - a little overlap is fine.
Thoroughly grease the sides of the pan.
Cake Instructions
In a small mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and optionally cardamom.
In a medium-sized mixing bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat sugar and eggs until thick and pale yellow.
Mix in milk and vanilla until just combined.
Add in olive oil a little bit at a time until just combined.
Mix in dry ingredients a little bit at a time until just combined.
Fold in orange zest.
Pour batter over oranges.
Bake for 60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. 40 minutes into the bake, check to see if the top is getting overly brown. If so, cover with foil for the remainder of the bake.
Remove from the oven and cool for 10 minutes before inverting onto a board. Transfer to a cooling rack.
When cool, slice and serve.
Notes
I have two lovely bloggers to thank for this recipe. First, I was inspired to make an upside-down blood orange and cardamom cake after seeing the beautiful caramelized blood orange and cardamom cake by Louise on Cygnet Kitchen. The olive oil pound cake recipe that I used as the base of the cake was adapted from the citrus olive oil cake by Naomi of Baker's Royale. Both bloggers are exceptionally talented and I encourage you to check out their recipes and stunning photography.