Ingredients
Ingredients
- 4 small sheets rice paper
- 100 g (3½ oz/¾ cup) skinned hazelnuts
- 100 g (3½ oz/⅔ cup) blanched almonds
- 1 teaspoon each whole coriander seeds, cloves, and black peppercorns
- ¼ teaspoon grated nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 50 g (1¾ oz/¼ cup) chopped dried figs
- 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
- 200 g (7 oz) roughly chopped mixed peel
- finely grated zest of 1 lemon
- 50 g (1¾ oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
- 150 g (5½ oz) sugar
- 4 tablespoons clear honey
- 40 g (1½ oz) unsalted butter
- icing (confectioners') sugar, to dust
Method
1. Butter and line the base of a 20 cm (8 inch) spring-form cake tin with rice paper. Cut a few thin strips to line the side as well. Preheat the oven to 150°C (300°F/Gas 2) and lightly brown the hazelnuts and almonds on a baking tray for 6–8 minutes. Check often, as the nuts can burn very quickly. Allow to cool.
2. Grind the whole spices together in a spice grinder or using a mortar and pestle. Put the nuts in a metal or china bowl with the spices, figs, cocoa, mixed peel, lemon zest and flour and mix together.
3. Put the sugar, honey and butter in a heavy-based saucepan over low heat to melt, briefly stirring the butter into the sugar as it just starts to melt. Do not stir again or the sugar will crystallise. Bring to the boil and cook until the syrup reaches 113°C (235°F) on a sugar thermometer, or a little of the syrup dropped into cold water forms a soft ball when moulded between your finger and thumb.
4. Immediately pour the syrup into the nut mixture and mix well, working quickly as it will soon cool and stiffen. Pour into the prepared tin and smooth the top with a spatula.
5. Bake for about 15 minutes. Unlike other cakes, this will not colour or seem very firm, even when cooked, but will begin to harden as it cools. Allow to cool a little in the tin until it is firm enough to enable the side of the tin to be removed. If the mixture is still quite soft when cooled, place in the fridge to set. To serve, dust the top heavily with icing sugar.
