Walnut Cake
Calabrian Walnut Cake (Torta di Noci)
As walnut cakes go, this must be the simplest and most essential of them all. The cake itself is made of just three ingredients–walnuts, eggs and sugar. A little lemon zest adds a delicate, fresh aroma and powdered sugar makes it pretty.
It's a traditional cake from Calabria in southern Italy–the sort of cake that was born out of age-old peasant traditions; the sort of cake that your nonna might whip up and have sitting on her kitchen bench, ready to be offered to guests with a short.
Ingredients
8 ounces ground walnuts (240 gr)
1 cup fine sugar (200 gr)
6 eggs, at room temperature seprated
8 walnut halves, for decoration
1 dash icing sugar for decoration
Juice and grated zest of 1 lemon
2 TBS cognac
2 tsp flour/matzomale
Sweetened whipping cream for serving
Preparation
Butter and flour a 9-inch pan. Preheat the oven to 350° F.
Pulverize the walnuts in a food processor until you have a coarse meal, the texture of sand.
Separate the egg yolks from the whites. Beat the sugar with the yolks until very fluffy and light in color, about 8 to 10 minutes. With a spatula, mix in the ground walnuts, lemon zest, flour/matzomale, cognac.
Beat the egg whites to soft peaks. In three parts, delicately fold the egg whites into the yolk mixture.
Pour the cake mixture into the pan and bake until it starts to shrink from the sides and a toothpick comes out just slightly humid but with no crumbs or cake mixture - 40 minutes depending on the oven. Do not overbake - it should be moist inside!
Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 5 minutes before turning it out on a cooling rack.
When cool, transfer to a serving plate, dust with a cloud of icing sugar, and decorate with the walnut halves.
Serve with slightly cold whipped cream. Enjoy!
Option: glaze with chocolate ganach.
Cake, Dessert