I love salty cakes and I always think of new ingredient combinations for salty cakes. The first time I heard of the idea of a salty cake was when I watched Rachel Khoo’s Little Paris Kitchen programme. Until then, the idea of a cake was always very sweet for me. But… not anymore!

 

 

A couple of weeks ago I saw a bunch of reaaaally nice asparagus in Stockmann and I immediately felt the need to do something with them. I actually had a tart in mind but in the end a salty cake was the winner.

 

 

The idea of a salty cake is very simple: you have an eggy cake base with olive oil and then you add different ingredient combinations. You may have a combination of sweet and salty like Rachel Khoo’s recipe which I also gave in the blog, or you may make something like a Mediterranean style combo, or you can make any combination you like!

 

 

 

Salty cakes are similar to making sandwiches, you just bake the whole thing instead of assembling them altogether and get an easier to eat result. So, as Khoo suggests, they go perfect with picnic parties! And now that it is getting warm finally, the picnic season has started! I absolutely recommend this cake for your next picnic! Enjoy!
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Ingredients:

 

Difficulty: ★☆☆ (Easy)
(makes 1 loaf, in 22×9, h:7cm loaf pan)
(adapted from BBC Good Food)

 

Printable PDF-recipe (no photos)

 

3 dl + 1 tbsp + 5 tsp / 1 + 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp dried thyme
3 eggs
1 dl milk
1 dl olive oil (plus a little more for greasing the pan)
1.5 dl green olives, pitted and roughly chopped
100 gr. sun-dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
100 gr. cheddar (or another hard cheese you like), grated
400 gr asparagus (when wooden parts are cut and peeled if needed, you should have clean, good asparagus parts of about 250 gr.), cut into 3 pieces each, cooked in boiling salty water for 2 minutes and drained well

 

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1. Preheat the oven to 180C. Grease the loaf pan with olive oil and cover with baking paper.

 

2. In a big bowl, put flour, baking powder, salt and dried thyme and whisk a little and then make a well in the middle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. Beat the eggs lightly. Pour eggs in the middle of flour mixture, followed by milk and olive oil. Whisk until all ingredients are well combined.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4. Add olives and sun-dried tomatoes. Leave just a bit of cheddar aside and add the rest to mixture. Put aside 5-6 pointy pieces of asparagus and add the rest to the mixture. Mix all ingredients well – using a spatula makes it easier.

 

 

 

 

 

 

5. Transfer the batter into loaf pan and smooth the surface. Arrange asparagus pieces on top, together with grated cheddar that you put aside before. Put in the oven, in medium rack and bake for 40 mins – until cake gets firm and gets a nice, golden colour. When baked, take it out of the oven and let it cool inside the pan for 10-15 minutes before removing from the pan. Continue cooling for more before serving. Enjoy!