Citrus spiced Madeira cake difficulty * #109 

Cuts into 10

Preparing time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: 50 minutes

Ingredients: 

• 4 star anise, broken into pieces 
• 175 g caster sugar
• 175 g slightly salted butter, softened
• 3 eggs
• finely rind of 1 orange
• 2 tablespoons orange juice 
• 250 g self-raising flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• small piece of candied orange peel, cut into thin strips

1. Put the star anise and 50 g of the sugar in a small food processor, blender or coffee grinder and grind until the star anise is completely ground and the sugar is flecked with colour
2. Tip into a bowl, add the butter, remaining sugar, eggs, orange rind and juice, flour and baking powder and beat together until pale and creamy
3. Spoon the mixture into a greased and lined 18 cm round cake tin and level the surface 
4. Place the strips of candied peel on the center of the cake
5. Bake in a preheated oven, 160C(325 F),Gas Mark 3, for about 50 minutes or until just firm to the touch and skewer inserted into the center comes out clean 
6. Loosen the edge, turn out on to a wire rack to peel off the lining paper 
7. Leave to cool
8. Enjoy! :-)