Honey Cake Recipe. 100% sweetened with honey and wafting an aroma of warm woody spices like cinnamon and cloves, this moist honey cake is perfect for tea time or with coffee.
With its dark golden crumb and flavor of floral honey in each bite, this honey cake is a perfect bite much needed warmth on a cold fall evening. While it bakes, the kitchen smells wonderful. Since honey cakes tend to become dry sometimes, the recipe uses full fat greek yogurt, which makes it incredibly moist.
A Perfect Tea cake
I love teacakes. Not only they make teatime special but they are incredibly easy to make. You do not need to make a frosting (less work!). I mostly make mine without a stand mixer. You will need two bowls, a spatula and a whisk. There is nothing fancy, its just a really good cake. You just need two bowls and we are going to hand mix it.
Choosing a Cake Pan
Bundt cake pan is suitable for baking dense moist cakes and this cake falls in the same category. The cake batter is on the runnier side and the hole in the middle of the cake pan allows air and heat to rise through the center of the cake. This helps in even cooking. Due to all the moisture in the cake batter from honey, yogurt, and eggs, if you try to bake this cake in a round cake pan, it will not cook properly in the center and might burn at the edges.
What Kind of Honey to Use for this Cake
Since honey is the main taste and one of the hero ingredient here, the key is to use a good quality honey. You don't have to select costly best variety, but definitely a decent variety. Clover honey is widely used in baking but here I suggest something more floral- wildflower or elderflower honey. You can also select herb infused honey like sage or orange blossom if you bake it during the autumn or winter months.
You could add a glaze - chocolate or sugar or dusting of powdered sugar if you wish. The cake in itself is mildly sweet. Since the batter quite runny, the nuts will sink to the bottom if you add them. The cake very keeps well in the fridge for a few days. I suggest to warm up a slice when serving, its so delicious when warmed a bit.
Spiced Honey Cake
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients
- 2 cup all purpose flour
- 1.5 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground cardamom
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
Wet Ingredients
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 cup any neutral oil
- 1 cup honey, measured after warming bit, see notes
- 10 tablespoons full fat greek yogurt, see notes
- 1 teaspoon orange zest, optional
- For drizzling :- Chocolate Glaze, Sugar Glaze, Chocolate Honey (optional)
Instructions
- Liberally spray or brush the sides and center flute of a 10- inch bundt pan with oil. Set aside.
- Preheat oven to 350F with rack in the middle.
- In a large bowl, sift the flour, baking powder, soda, salt and all the spice powders together.
- In another large bowl, add yogurt and crack the eggs and beat them lightly. Measure oil first, add and whisk to combine. Without wiping, use the same cup in which you measured oil to measure the honey. Add to the wet ingredinets. Add the zest(if using), whisk everything to combine to smooth.
- Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and add the entire honey mixture, stir and fold gently with a spatula to mix everything, don't over mix. Its okay if you see some lumps.
- Pour the batter into the bundt pan (it is a slightly runny batter so it will level itself else use a spatula to level).
- Bake in oven until a skewer comes out clean 50- 55 minutes.
- Take the cake pan out of the oven and place on the counter and let the cake cool for 25 minutes in the pan. You will notice it will pull out from the sides of the pan.
- Loosen the cake from the pan using a thin spatula or a butter knife and invert on a cooling rack to completely cool down.
- Drizzle glaze (if using) once completely cooled. Slice and serve.
- Store leftovers covered on the kitchen counter during winter months for 2 days. Else store refrigerated. This cake can be sliced and frozen for 1 month as well.
Samiya
I made this cake and my whole family LOVED it! It was gone in 2 days! Thank you for this incredible recipe, it will be one I return to often!
Tanvi Srivastava
Yay! Thank you, one of our favorites too!