These gluten free honey, thyme and lemon mini syrup cakes are sweet, delicate and delicious,
best served with a dollop of yoghurt.
Welcome to recipes by Carina where I share with you how to make simple and delicious
recipes.
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I was inspired to make these cakes from this beautiful Thyme and Honey candle from The
Remarkable Candle Company here in Central Otago of New Zealand.
They have such beautiful scents, I’ll have the link in the description box below if you
want any for yourself.
To make these mini cakes in a medium sized mixing bowl or in the bowl of your stand mixer
add half a cup or 60g of icing sugar or powdered sugar.
These are both the same ingredient, just different names depending on where you live in the world.
To the icing sugar you’ll need a cup, 2 sticks or about 225g of room temperature butter.
We are going to be creaming the butter and sugar together here so make sure your butter
is at room temperature as if it’s straight out of the fridge you’ll have such a hard
time trying to mix it.
If you would like the full recipe for these Thyme, Honey and Lemon Mini Syrup Cakes it
will be on my website as well as the full measurements listed in the description box
below.
I’ll also have a link to my playlist of all my other gluten free recipes if that is
something you are interested in.
Once you’ve creamed your butter and sugar together for about 3 to 4 minutes or so it
should be paler in colour, and light and fluffy in texture.
Next we’re going to add the eggs.
You’ll need 4 medium sized good quality eggs and again make sure these are at room
temperature.
Just remove them from the fridge about an hour or so before you start baking.
Crack the eggs into the bowl, one at a time and beat well with your mixer in between each
addition.
We’re trying to add a good amount of air into the eggs which in turn will result in
a lighter and fluffier cake.
Adding the eggs to fast here, or adding cold eggs can cause your batter to curdle.
All is not lost if it does curdle, it’ll come back together once we add the dry ingredients
but you won’t be able to get near as much air into the batter.
Just make sure to go as slow as possible with the eggs, and really give them a good mix
until they are fully incorporated into the batter.
Let me know in the description box below if you are going to try this recipe.
It’s a really nice fresh tasting cake which pairs perfectly with a dollop of yoghurt for
some tang.
The syrup gives it such an interesting texture and flavour, let me just say that dry is that
last thing you would ever use to describe this cake.
I’m baking them in a mini loaf tins, but it can also be baked as one large cake, round
or square, or even in a cupcake tin.
To give these cakes a little flavour and a small amount more sweetness we’re adding
honey.
The cake batter isn’t actually to sweet or flavourful as most of that will come from
the syrup we pour over later.
If you’re not a fan of honey you can just substitute it with equal amounts of sugar.
Add about a 1/4 cup, whatever kind you have on hand or whatever kind you would like to
use into the bowl, along with a small amount of vanilla essence and give it a good mix
until everything is fully combined.
Lastly we just need to get our dry ingredients together.
In a smaller bowl measure out a cup of ground almonds or almond meal.
You can substitute this with another kind of ground nuts but I think almonds give it
the best flavour, and texture but are not at all over powering.
To the almonds we’ll also need a cup of fine semolina, not course.
This cake is gluten free, as long as you are using gluten free baking powder.
Theres no way you’ll ever miss flour here as it has such a great flavour and texture
so if you’re ever on the lookout for gluten free baking recipes this is a great one to
keep on hand.
To the almonds and semolina add a pinch of salt, about 1/2 a teaspoons worth and 2 teaspoons
of baking powder to help these cakes rise.
Use a whisk and give the ingredients a good mix until they are well combined.
The final ingredient we’ll need for the cake batter is some lemon zest.
You’ll need all of the zest from a medium sized lemon, zest it straight into the bowl
with the dry ingredients, give it another quick mix.
Pour the bowl of dry ingredients into the bowl with the wet ingredients.
Swap to a wooden spoon here and give the cake batter a good mix together until you no longer
see any dry ingredients.
Divide the batter into a greased mini loaf, cupcake, or cake tin.
I’m only using 6 of my spaces so each of the loaves are a decent size.
If you are using a cupcake tin you should get about 10 or so cupcakes out of this batter.
Place the mini loaves into a 180C|350F oven for 20-25 minutes or until the loaves are
golden brown and spring back when pressed.
If you are using a cake tin you may need closer to 40 minutes baking time.
While the mini cakes are baking we can get started on making the syrup we will pour over
the cakes.
In a small saucepan we’re going to measure out the sugar.
You’ll need half a cup or 100g.
Pour this straight into the saucepan along with 2 tablespoons of honey.
The honey flavour will be much stronger here than it is in the cakes so if you’re not
a fan it can be left out completely.
To the sugar and honey add a lemon peel as well as a few sprigs of thyme.
No need to cut these up at the flavour will infuse into the syrup.
Finally pour over half a cup of cold water.
Place the saucepan over medium to low heat, give it a mix and simmer the syrup together
for about 10 to 15 minutes.
During this the flavour from the lemon peel and thyme will infuse and the sugar and honey
will dissolve creating this beautiful syrup.
When you cakes have finished baking pull them out of the oven and using a toothpick or skewer
you want to pierce many holes in the top of each cake.
This will allow the syrup to absorb better.
Pour the syrup over each cake and place the pan back into the oven for another 10 minutes
for the cakes to absorb all of the syrup.
These are best served at room temperature with a dollop of yoghurt on the side.
Let me know if you are going to try this recipe.
Thank you for watching and I will see you in my next video.