Baking #114: Orange Cranberry Loaves

Did baking this morning after coming home from Kuala Lurah. I wanted to bake an Orange Butter Loaf but got sidetracked when I found a recipe for Orange Cranberries Loaves. Wanted to use up the dried cranberries which I bought quite some time ago. So, I attempted this recipe since I have been a huge fan of citrus flavored cakes recently.

Orange Cranberries Loaves (adapted from Everyday Food with Sarah Carey)

Ingredients: 

• 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature *226g*
• 3-1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder *1 tsp*
• 1 tsp fine salt
• 1 cup whole milk
• 2 tbsp grated orange zest *zest from one large navel orange*
• 2 cups fine granulated sugar *200g*
• 10 tbsp freshly squeezed orange juice *1/2 cup*
• 4 large eggs
• 1-1/2 cups dried cranberries, chopped

Directions:

1. In a large mixing bowl, combine together dry ingredients – all purpose flour, baking powder and salt. Sift and set aside for later use.
2. In another large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, takes approximately 8 minutes.
3. Add in orange zest and mix well.
4. Add in eggs, one at a time and beat well before adding in the next egg.
5. Add in sifted dry ingredients and the wet ingredients (orange juice & milk) in the sequence of dry-wet-dry-wet-dry. Make sure you end the sequence with flour.
6. Gently fold in the dried cranberries to just incorporate.
7. Pour batter into two 9×5-inches baking loaf pans and bake in a preheated oven of 180 degree Celsius for 50 to 60 minutes until an inserted cake tester comes out clean.
8. Allow the cake to cool in the baking pan for 10 to 15 minutes before cooling the cake completely on a wire cooling rack.

This was how the cake looked like when sliced up. I did not wait for the cake to cool completely before slicing it up. The kitchen smelled buttery good when this was still baking in the oven. As I did not coat the dried cranberries with flour, some of them sunk onto the bottom of the cake. I think I had overbaked the cake as the bottom was pretty burnt.

The texture of the cake is soft at the moment as it is still warm. Hopefully, it won’t turn dense later when cooled down. I mislooked the quantity required for baking powder. I used a teaspoon only. No wonder my cake did not rise much. LOL! Taste wise, it was good with buttery and yet orange-y taste. The sweetness was okay for me as the sourness from dried cranberries compensated it.

The top of my cakes were not browned evenly as I started off baking with 170 degree Celsius. I increased the temperature to 180 degree Celsius when I found out that the cake top did not brown even though they were already half an hour into baking time. If I were to try this recipe again next time, I am gonna bake them with 180 degree Celsius.