alison roman's blackberry ricotta cake

alison roman's blackberry ricotta cake

• 29 May 2023

It's been pretty wintery here in Sydney and berries abound in the fruit shop, but they're still pretty pricey. I had frozen blackberries and raspberries in the freezer and ricotta in the fridge, so I decided to make Alison Roman's raspberry ricotta cake.

At the last minute I swapped blackberries for the raspberries. My ricotta was very dry so I used a stand mixer to make the cake batter and swapped the order in which the ingredients were added. The batter was a little dry, so I also added a a tablespoon of milk to the batter before I folded in the berries. Despite the changes, the cake took no time at all to put together.

Here's the recipe for you, which makes a 17 cm cake, which was adapted from here. For all my recipes I use a 250ml cup and a 20 ml tablespoon, unsalted butter and 60g eggs. My oven is a conventional gas oven so if your oven is fan forced you may need to reduce the oven temperature by 20°C. 

Alison Roman Blackberry Ricotta Cake – makes a 17cm cake
Ingredients
110g plain flour 
1½ tsp baking powder 
pinch salt 
2 tsp grated lemon rind
125g caster sugar 
180g well drained ricotta cheese 
60g unsalted butter melted, then cooled a little
2 eggs 
1 tsp vanilla extract 
200g blackberries, fresh or frozen

Topping
30g caster sugar

Method
Preheat the oven to 180°C, conventional. Grease, flour and line the base of a 17 cm round cake tin with baking paper.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a small bowl. In the bowl of a stand mixer rub the lemon zest into the sugar with your fingers. Attach the paddle then add the ricotta and beat until smooth. Drizzle in the melted butter and when incorporated add the eggs and vanilla. Add the flour to the ricotta mix in thirds and stir until just blended. 

If the batter is a little stiff mix in 1-2 tbs milk by hand to loosen the mixture then fold in 100g of the berries, crushing them ever so slightly as you fold – you don’t want them to disappear into the batter, just to be distributed evenly to create a nice, streaky look, almost like tie-dye. Transfer the batter to the cake tin and scatter with the remaining berries then sprinkle the extra caster sugar over the top of the cake. 

Bake at 180°C conventional, on the centre rack of the preheated oven for 55-65 minutes or until the cake is golden brown, and a tester or toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Use a knife to loosen the edges of the cake then cool on a wire rack for at least 20 minutes before unmoulding.

The cake can be baked 3 days ahead, wrapped tightly in plastic and stored at room temperature.

I had a piece of cake for my dessert and it's very good. It's lightly sweetened with a slight hint of lemon; you can definitely taste the ricotta and it's filled with berries. Now I can't wait to make the raspberry version.

See you all again next week with some more baking from my kitchen.

Bye for now,

Jillian