(Wim)berry cake

On a recent work trip to North Wales, my colleague Paul told me about spending childhood days picking wild wimberries on the mountains near his home.  He couldn’t believe it when I said I’d never heard of, let alone tasted, a wimberry. He tried to explain that they were like mini blueberries, but was determined to find some and bring them into work.  True to his word, he came in the next week with a small tub and presented me with my first wimberry – delicious, but unfortunately he’d not found a very large crop and the tub he brought in contained only a single, solitary wimberry – not enough to bake with!  For his birthday, I made this cake – unfortunately, I could not find the elusive wimberries to bake with either, so I made do with a combination of blueberries, redcurrants and blackcurrants.  If I ever find enough wimberries, I will bake them in this recipe – but for the time being, I’m still less than convinced that they really exist (perhaps what Paul gave me was just the tiniest blueberry he could find...)

Ingredients

8 oz butter

8 oz caster sugar

Zest of 1 lemon

Zest or 1 orange

4 eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

8 oz self-raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

3 oz ground almonds

5 tbsp Greek yoghurt

4 oz blueberries

2 oz redcurrants

2 oz blackcurrants

Juice of ½ a lemon

1 tsbp plain flour

For the icing

6 oz cream cheese

2 tbsp Greek yoghurt

Juice of ½ a lemon

3 oz icing sugar

To decorate

Blueberries, redcurrants and blackcurrants

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C and grease and line the base and sides of a 24cm round cake tin.
2. In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter, sugar, orange and lemon zest until pale and fluffy.
3. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat well.
4. Sift in the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and ground almonds, and beat to combine smoothly.
5. Fold in the Greek yoghurt and pour into the prepared cake tin, spreading it level.
6. In a clean bowl, toss the berries in the juice of half the lemon, then stir in a spoonful of flour to coat them well. 
7. Sprinkle the berries evenly over the top of the cake batter.
8. Bake for 50 minutes until it is well risen and a cake tester comes out clean.
9. Cool for 10 minutes in the tin, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
10. To make the icing, beat the cream cheese, yoghurt and lemon juice and sifted icing sugar until smooth and creamy.  Leave to chill in the fridge until the cake is completely cool.
11. Spread the icing over the top of the cake and scatter with berries.  Refrigerate to allow the icing to set.