Yes, you read that title right. Don’t be alarmed. Just look at this:
From Coronation Grape Cake |
How can that gorgeousness not be good?
This cake came about because of an impulse purchase. I spotted dusky purple grapes at the market and couldn’t resist. If you’ve wondered all your life why grape candy doesn’t taste like grapes, wonder no more–it’s modeled after grapes like these. In Canada, we have coronation grapes, which are similar to concord. They have deep purple flavour, and are much less sweet than a green or red table grape. While I know these aren’t wine grapes, they’re the first grapes I’ve ever tasted that made a grape-wine flavour connection for me. So there you go! Grapes, real, grapey grapes.
But what do you do with a grape like this? Well, I’ve got plans for sorbet, but my first thought, maybe because the grapes remind me a bit of blueberries, was cake.
This recipe is adapted from a Patricia Wells recipe, and I highly recommend it. The grapes are tart and flavourful, and I substituted some ground almonds for the flour, which gave a rich nuttiness that’s fantastic. The recipe also calls for olive oil. I’m not sure exactly what this adds to the flavour, not having tasted this cake with butter, but it makes for a great texture. This is the kind of cake I love, a dense, rustic treat that you can serve as dessert, or slice for a decadent breakfast. Plus, you get to say “would you like some grape cake?,” which at least gets people’s attention.
From Coronation Grape Cake |
GRAPE CAKE
2 large eggs
2/3 cups sugar (use less if your grapes are on the sweet side–mine were quite tart), plus extra for finishing the cake
4 Tbsp melted butter
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup ground almonds (feel free to substitute flour here if you don’t have almonds, or even scale back the flour a bit and add more almond flour)
3/4 tsp baking power
a pinch of salt
zest of one lemon
2 cups flavourful grapes
Equipment: a 9″ round cake pan
Butter and flour a cake pan, then set it aside. Preheat your oven to 350 F.
Beat the eggs and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer until they’re thick, about 3 minutes. Beat in milk, butter, oil, and vanilla.
Sift together the flour, almonds, baking powder and salt. Add the zest, tossing it to make sure it is well-distributed. Then stir the flour mixture into the wet ingredients, making sure it is well-combined. Allow this mixture to sit for 10 minutes to make sure the flour has absorbed the liquids.
Gently stir in 1 1/2 cups of grapes, then transfer the batter to your cake pan.
Bake on the middle rack for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, pull out your cake and top it with the reserved grapes. Sprinkle coarse granulated sugar overtop. Bake for about 40 more minutes, until the top of the cake is golden and springy. Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the pan.
Something else to do with grapes: check out this beautiful tart at Lottie + Doof
26 comments
Comments feed for this article
October 21, 2008 at 1:21 pm
kickpleat
oooh, that looks good. i’ve got a crapload of really delicious coronation grapes and sour grapes that a friend picked from her workplace. i think i need to make this cake!
October 21, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Victoria
Oh, that looks very, very good. I’ll have to try it myself and pass it on to my friend Ursula (originally from Germany) who has vines of concord grapes that she harvests once a year.
Soooooooooooooo
good to have you back!
October 21, 2008 at 5:25 pm
Lori
Looks very yummy. I recently did Grape Focaccia. I am planning Grape sorbet as well. I just love them in the Fall.
October 21, 2008 at 5:58 pm
EB
The picture with the sugar dusting looks so amazing. I wish I could try those coronation grapes. mmm.
October 21, 2008 at 10:34 pm
clynch
kickpleat: try it, try it! I’m excited to hear that someone else has coronation grapes to use.
Victoria: It’s nice to find new uses for slightly unusual produce, isn’t it?
Lori: Grape focaccia!! That sounds super-interesting. I’d love to hear more.
EB: They are pretty tasty grapes.
October 21, 2008 at 10:47 pm
malloryelise
i don’t think i have ever seen a grape cake, no one ever bakes with grapes. yay for you!
October 22, 2008 at 7:01 am
Niall Harbison
I clicked on this photo in Foodgawker thinking it was a blueberry cake of some sort! I am a chef and have never actually tried a grape cake or even knew it existed to be honest! Thats what I love about cooking…the fact that you never know it all and can learn something from anybody every day of the week!
October 22, 2008 at 8:44 am
Patricia Scarpin
Wow, that look so good! I’d love to try baking with grapes.
October 22, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Erin
There is a recipe for Torta al Vino in a Lidia Bastianich cookbook; Lidia’s Family Table… it’s almost exactly the same.. but it uses wine instead of milk – and no almonds, but i think that would be a delicious addition. It’s awesome with blueberries. the combo of sweet and tart is a-m-a-z-i-n-g.
October 22, 2008 at 2:03 pm
hannehanne
malloryelise: Yeah, it was a pretty interesting discovery for me. I’m glad I tried it!
Niall: It does look like a blueberry cake. That’s part of what I like about it, I think. And, like Erin says, it would be great with blueberry too.
Patricia: you should try it! The cake is delicious.
Erin: I’ve never used a Lidia Bastianich cookbook, but that sounds fantastic!
October 22, 2008 at 6:19 pm
gudpal
I hope someone can HELP me. I’d like to make this, it looks so good. Except for this problem on which I need some advice: the ingredients list refers to “baking powder” but the instructions refer instead to “baking soda.” Which one should I use?
October 22, 2008 at 8:47 pm
Laura
This sounds delicious! I can’t wait to begin! The recipe doesn’t mention the temperature for baking, though. I’m also concerned about what gudpai brought up in her question.
October 22, 2008 at 10:03 pm
hannehanne
Gudpal: Thanks for catching that! The ingredient should be baking powder, like I put in the ingredients list. It’s changed in the instructions now too.
Laura: The temperature for baking is 350 F. It’s hidden in the first line of introductions. I should have made it more clear.
January 23, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Ngoc
This was an amazing cake! Just made it for a dinner party, and everyone loved it. Thanks for sharing the recipe. :)
August 27, 2009 at 7:01 pm
melanie
Hello – I’m a little late to the grape cake party, but I finally saw concord grapes in the store and I’ve been dying to make this cake. One question though – do you seed the grapes first? I assume you must, but there’s no mention of it, and I didn’t even think about it until I bit into a grape to taste it? (Love your site – btw!)
August 29, 2009 at 4:51 pm
hannehanne
Melanie, I didn’t even think of the seeding question because I used coronation grapes, which are similar but not identical to concords. I guess one of the differences is the seeds! I’d definitely seed them, though. It’s not fun to be picking seeds out of teeth when you’re trying to enjoy dessert.
October 5, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Highly Delicious Grape Cake Pudding Thinamajig « In My Box
[…] a gluten-free pie crust. Also, Duck hates pie absolutely. I decided on a recipe for Grape Cake from Supper in Stereo, only of course the recipe was neither vegan nor […]
October 5, 2009 at 1:57 pm
scrumptious
Thanks for the great recipe! I made this last night. It was a bit of an adventure as I was also trying to make it vegan and gluten free as well. It ended up as more of a pudding-cake-thingie but boy was it delicious! I thought you might enjoy reading about my adventure: http://inmybox.wordpress.com/2009/10/05/highly-delicious-grape-cake-pudding-thinamajig/
October 5, 2009 at 4:10 pm
hannehanne
Scrumptious, Thanks for dropping me a line! Your adaptation has inspired me to play with the proportions of my recipe a bit. I’d love for it to be more almond flavoured, so I think I’m going to try upping the almond flour next time I try this.
October 5, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Left Over « Supper In Stereo
[…] mismatched china. I suddenly realized that I didn’t have almond meal as I was making dessert (grape cake!). There was a hockey game on while we ate (first game of the season), and the Oilers lost. But the […]
November 12, 2009 at 1:54 am
Thursday already? « Zombietronics
[…] going to eat it like it’s going out of style. If you want to try your hand at grape cake, HERE’S the recipe. If you’re worried that yours will fail too, I think that my problem was either A) […]
September 7, 2010 at 2:47 pm
Teresa
What a lovely cake! I made this recipe with a cup of peeled coronation grapes, added a tablespoon of rosemary and poured the batter into a mini loaf pan. They turned out marvelously!
Thanks a bunch for the post :)
September 7, 2010 at 6:35 pm
hannehanne
Teresa, I’m glad you liked it! I’ve been seeing coronation grapes popping up in the market lately and thinking of this cake. I’ll have to try it with rosemary. What a great idea!
March 5, 2011 at 7:58 pm
Grape Cake or Winemaker’s Cake | Aude France
[…] found a lot of recipes and this is the one I ended up using – thanks to Supper in Stereo, I had seedless table grapes, red and green, and used them. I didn’t have almonds or […]
April 4, 2011 at 5:49 am
Savor the Season: Concord Grape Cake | The Real Time Farms Blog
[…] lovely plump concord grapes from the Ann Arbor Farmers Market, and remembered seeing a recipe for a Grape Cake on Supper in Stereo, so I decided to give it a […]
September 2, 2013 at 11:31 am
Emily Sammut
I tried this recipe, and it was fantastic! :) The flavours work together really well, and it’s just a rich delicious cake you just want to keep eating. My only tiny complaint is that mine came out a littleee on the flat side, but I’ll try it again with more baking powder or I’ll just use a smaller tin. Thanks for sharing this recipe, great job :)