This Persian-inspired tea loaf cake is not only beautiful to look at, but tastes delicious, too.
It's really easy to make, and has lovely sweet and floral flavours from the dried fruits and Earl grey tea.
For more loaf cake recipes, we have a whole gallery to fuel you with weekend baking inspiration.
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Yields:
8 - 10 serving(s)
Prep Time:
30 mins
Cook Time:
1 hr 30 mins
Total Time:
2 hrs
Cal/Serv:
349
Ingredients
275ml
hot, strong Earl Grey or English Breakfast tea
125g
each dried figs and apricots, roughly chopped
150g
sultanas
125g
light brown soft sugar
10
green cardamon pods
75g
pistachios, finely ground
200g
self-raising flour
1/2tsp.
rosewater
2
medium eggs, beaten
For the icing
150g
icing sugar
pink food colouring, optional
25g
pistachios, chopped
dried rose petals, optional
Directions
Step 1
Pour tea into a medium bowl; add dried fruit and brown sugar. Stir to dissolve sugar, then leave to soak for a minimum of 1hr or preferably overnight.
Step 2
Preheat oven to 150°C (130°C fan) mark 2. Line a 900g loaf tin with baking parchment. Bash open cardamom pods in a pestle and mortar, pick out seeds and discard husks. Grind seeds to a powder. Scrape ground cardamom into a large bowl and mix in ground pistachios and flour. Add the soaked fruit mixture, the rosewater and the eggs; mix to combine.
Step 3
Scrape mixture into prepared tin, level and bake for 1hr 20-1hr 30min until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool in tin for 5min, remove from tin and cool completely on a wire rack.
Step 4
Transfer cooled loaf to a board; remove parchment. Sift icing sugar into bowl and mix in about 1½tbsp cold water to make a thick but spreadable consistency (you may need a drop more water). Dye pink with food colouring, if using. Spread over top of cake, so it dribbles down sides. Scatter over pistachios and rose petals, if using. Allow to set before
serving in slices.
GH Tip: If you’re not a fan of rosewater, use orange blossom water instead for this fragrantly exotic confection.
To store: Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a week.
An experienced and highly skilled team of food writers, stylists and digital content producers, the Good Housekeeping Cookery Team is a close-knit squad of food obsessives. Cookery Editor Emma Franklin is our resident chilli obsessive and barbecue expert, who spends an inordinate amount of time on holidays poking round the local supermarkets seeking out new and exciting foods. Senior Cookery Writer Alice Shields is a former pastry chef and baking fanatic who loves making bread and would have peanut butter with everything if she could. Her favourite carb is pasta, and our vibrant green spaghetti is her weeknight go-to. Lover of all things savoury, Senior Cookery Writer Grace Evans can be found eating crispy corn and nocellara olives at every opportunity, and will take the cheeseboard over dessert any time (though she cannot resist a slice of tres leches cake). With a wealth of professional kitchen know-how, culinary training and years of experience between them, they are all dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work (and if they don’t – we’ll have the answer for why*) every time (*90% of the time the answer is: “buy an separate oven thermometer”!).
