A Year of Seasonal Cakes · September: Fig Leaf & Hazelnut Cake

Brown butter, ripe figs and the quiet perfume of late summer

September always feels like a little turning point in the kitchen. Summer is still generous, but you can sense the first signs of autumn in the markets and gardens.

This month, I wanted to bake with two things I love at this time of year: ripe figs and toasted hazelnuts. And then there are the fig leaves: fragrant, generous and, as it turns out, rather wonderful for wrapping a cake while it bakes.

This is the first cake in A Year of Seasonal Cakes: twelve cakes, one for each month, celebrating what the season has to offer.

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Fig Leaf & Hazelnut Cake

Course Dessert

Cuisine seasonal

Keyword fig leaves, figs, hazelnuts

Prep Time 40 minutes minutes

Cook Time 40 minutes minutes

Resting time 30 minutes minutes

Total Time 1 hour hour 50 minutes minutes

Author Antonetta Santagata

Equipment

• 1 spring cake form

Ingredients

• 180 g unsalted butter plus some butter for greasing the tin
• 200 g finely ground toasted hazelnuts
• 120 g icing sugar
• 50 g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
• 180 g egg whites
• 1 tsp vanilla paste
• finely grated zest of ½ lemon
• 10-12 fresh fig leaves
• 8-10 ripe figs halved
• 40 g toasted hazelnuts roughly chopped
• 15 g demerara sugar
• flaky sea salt

Instructions

• Brown the butter until deeply golden and nutty. Cool until warm.
  
• Heat the oven to 170°C fan.
• Butter a 22 cm spring cake form.
• Wash and dry the fig leaves. Brush lightly with brown butter and overlap them to line the tin.
  
• Mix hazelnuts, icing sugar, flour, salt and lemon zest.
• Lightly whisk the egg whites - don't whip them.
• Stir egg whites and vanilla into the dry ingredients.
• Slowly incorporate the brown butter.
• Rest the batter for 20–30 minutes.
• Pour into the tin. Arrange figs on top and scatter with chopped hazelnuts, demerara sugar and a little flaky salt.
  
• Fold some of the leaves gently over the edges.
• Bake 40–45 minutes, until deeply golden and just set.
• Cool 20 minutes and remove the leaves before serving.

Baker’s Notes

Fig leaves
The leaves aren’t simply a beautiful way of lining the tin. They perfume the cake as it bakes, giving it a subtle fragrance of green walnut, coconut and warm hay. Use fresh, healthy leaves from an untreated tree and dry them well before using.

Hazelnuts
Toast them before grinding. It makes a remarkable difference to the flavour. Grind them finely for the batter, but keep some more coarsely chopped for the top so that there is a little contrast in texture.

Egg whites
Don’t whip them. Lightly loosened egg whites give the cake its characteristic tender, slightly chewy financier crumb without making it heavy.

Figs
Choose ripe figs that are still firm enough to hold their shape. Very soft figs release a lot of moisture during baking.