Blueberry White Chocolate Cake With Labneh, Mint and Rose
A delicious melt-in-the-mouth yet light and crumbly cake filled with homemade labneh and flavoured with mint and rose. The sponge is made with the whey leftover from the labneh. It's also made with wholemeal spelt flour and buckwheat. Works beautifully as a dessert as well as for afternoon tea.
Prep Time40 minutesmins
Cook Time20 minutesmins
Draining Time8 hourshrs
Total Time9 hourshrs
Course: Afternoon Tea, Dessert
Cuisine: Middle Eastern
Keyword: blueberries, cake, labneh, layer cake, mint, rose, white chocolate
100gwhite chocolate(I use Green & Black's which is nice and vanillary)
175ggolden caster sugar(I use vanilla sugar)
200gflour(I use 100g wholemeal spelt 50g white spelt and 50g buckwheat)
1tspbaking powder
1pinchsea or rock salt(I use Himalayan pink rock salt)
2large eggs
1tbsprose water
50gwhey
1tspicing sugar for dusting
Instructions
Labneh
The night before making the cake, empty the yoghurt into a muslin cloth and hang it up over a jug to drain for the night. To do this, I use an elastic band to tie the cloth at the top and then I hang it from one of our kitchen cupboard door handles. Just make sure you leave a jug underneath to catch the whey.
500 g natural yoghurt, 1 vanilla pod
The next day, turn the yoghurt, now labneh, into a bowl and give it a good stir. Scrape the vanilla seeds in at this point, if using. Keep the whey that's drained into the jug to use in the cake.
Mint Syrup
Dissolve the sugar in a pan with the water over a low heat. Then bring to a boil and simmer for about 10 minutes when it should be slightly syrupy.
100 g golden caster sugar, 100 ml water
Turn off the heat, add the mint and rose water and cover the pan. Leave to infuse for at least three hours. The longer the better.
2 sprigs mint, 1 tbsp rose water
Stir the blueberries into the syrup and leave to infuse for another hour.
250 g blueberries
Drain off about half of the syrup and reserve. Add the remainder, along with the blueberries, to the labneh. Stir well.
White Chocolate Cake
Preheat the oven to 180℃ (160℃ fan, 350℉, Gas 4).
Melt the butter in a pan over a gentle heat with the white chocolate and sugar. Remove from the heat and give it all a good stir.
200 g unsalted butter, 100 g white chocolate, 175 g golden caster sugar
Sift the flours into a large bowl along with the baking powder and salt.
200 g flour, 1 tsp baking powder, 1 pinch sea or rock salt
Make a well in the centre and pour in the butter mixture.
Stir from the inside out until just incorporated, then beat in the eggs.
2 large eggs
Add whey and rose water then stir until everything is just incorporated.
50 g whey, 1 tbsp rose water
Divide the mixture between two 22 cm round silicone moulds or lined cake tins. Bake for twenty minutes until well risen and firm to the touch.
Spoon some of the reserved syrup over both cakes whilst still hot.
Leave to cool for ten minutes, then carefully turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Sandwich them together with the labneh and blueberry mixture. Dust with icing sugar and decorate with a few blueberries and sprigs of mint.
1 tsp icing sugar for dusting
Notes
For a deeper cake, use 20 cm (8 inch) cake tins and bake for twenty five minutes.For most efficient timings, make the syrup at the same time as the labneh, then soak the blueberries in the syrup just before you start to make the cake. You can mix up the labney whilst the cakes are cooling.Whey is useful for all sorts of things and keeps well in a sealed bottle in the fridge for a couple of weeks.Please note: calories and other nutritional information are per serving. They’re approximate and will depend on exact ingredients used.