Orange Honey Cake with Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting; impossibly moist cake spiked with orange zest and runny honey, slathered with tangy vanilla cream cheese frosting.
Citrus season is upon us.
Clementines, grapefruits, and oranges are at their best. Big ones, little ones, bright sunshiney ones and green-flecked ones. While these fruits are always best celebrated in their whole natural form, spooned and slurped, or peeled and pulled and bitten into, they also make for glorious ingredients. Orange zest adds intrigue to any kind of sweet or savoury recipe, and grapefruit zest is a deeply underrated additional element.
I particularly love sharing orange-infused recipes at this time of year. The rest of the internet may be shoving gym memberships and the newest health food fads down your throat, but I’ll be here providing recipe for Fluffy Ginger Cake with Orange Zest or Salted Dark Chocolate Orange Cookies.
The orange honey cake before you today, with its thick spread of vanilla cream cheese frosting, is another annual celebration of citrus. It is the product of a slightly softening orange in the fruit bowl at home, and a beautiful little jar of Scottish honey I received as a gift for Christmas. Both ingredients deserved to be seen and shared by more than one person, and thus this cake was in the oven before I gave it a second thought.
You can watch me make it here, on my YouTube channel!
A soft and impossibly moist cake, gently flavoured with that orange zest and runny honey. A generous slather of sweet but tangy frosting, drizzled with a little extra honey for welcome shine and stickiness.
This isn’t a typical wintery cake, heavy with spices or dried fruits. It’s a traybake, easy but impressive. It’s moist yet light in its flavours, neither too sickly or too dense. It’s fluffy, with the slightest crisp at its squared edges, made golden and toasty-sweet thanks to the honey.
The frosting is a nod to my favourite homemade cream cheese frosting, most often sandwiched between the layers of the best ever red velvet cake. Just sweet enough to lift the sharpness of the cheese, just tangy enough to balance out the honey sweetness. That bit creamy enough to easily spread and stay put, that bit soft enough to leave you licking your lips for more. Of course, cream cheeses can vary in consistency, so don’t worry if it needs to sit in the fridge for a bit before using!
I kept this orange honey cake’s decoration super simple (or rather, lazy) with just a drizzle of extra honey, using a honey dipper for extra and even effect. You could also grate over some extra orange zest, dust over the tiniest pinch of ground cinnamon, or even scatter over a gentle pinch of flaky sea salt. Whatever you do, enjoy eating this orange honey cake in big mouthfuls, to make sure you get the perfect balance of soft flavour and sticky sweetness.
Want to save this orange honey cake for later? You can pin the image below!
To make this orange honey cake with vanilla cream cheese frosting, simply follow the recipe below:
Ingredients
For the Orange Honey Cake:
- 200g (13 tbsp) soft salted butter
- 100g (½ cup) caster sugar or soft brown sugar
- 100g (⅓ cup) runny honey, plus extra for decoration
- 3 large eggs
- 200g (1 ½ cup) self-raising flour
- Zest of ½ an orange
For the Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting:
- 100g (6 ½ tbsp) soft salted butter
- 100g (3 ½ oz) full-fat cream cheese, such as Philadelphia
- 300g (2 ½ cups) icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla bean paste, or 2 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
For the Orange Honey Cake:
- Preheat your oven – 180 C / 160 C fan / 350 F / gas mark 4.
- Grease and line a 20 x 20 cm (8 x 8 in) square cake tin.
- In a large bowl, beat together your soft butter and sugar for 2 minutes.
- Add the honey and beat for a further 2 minutes.
- Stir your eggs in one at a time until the mixture is fluffy.
- Tip in the flour and orange zest and gently whisk in until JUST combined into a smooth cake batter. (Over-mixing can make your cake come out tough or chewy, and no one wants that!)
- Pour the mixture into your prepared tin and smooth over the top.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 25-30 minutes. By this time the cake should be risen, and a skewer inserted into the centre should be clean when removed.
- Remove the cake from the oven and allow to cool.
- Meanwhile, you can make your frosting.
For the Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting:
- Beat together the butter, the vanilla and half the icing sugar until combined.
- Add the remaining sugar and the cream cheese and beat vigorously until fully incorporated and pale in colour. (It may be slightly too soft at this stage, if so, chilling it in the fridge for 30-40 minutes should bring it right!)
- Once the cake is completely cool and your icing is your preferred consistency, spread the frosting thickly all over the top.
- If you like, drizzle over a little extra honey, or grate over some extra orange zest.
- Now just slice and enjoy!
BE A MAVERICK: this honey cake would be similarly delicious with the zest of a lemon or grapefruit instead of orange!
This orange honey cake will keep well for up to 3 days in an airtight container, ideally somewhere cool. However, it is always best enjoyed fresh!
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