An Inspired Variation: Blood Orange and Lavender Yogurt Loaf Cake

This is really special. Who can image that you can combine orange and lavender together? I most definitely did not consider this combination to be possible. I like these two things separately or with other elements. Lavender with lemon or orange with chocolate. Now, consider this unique combination of citrus and floral. This is a winner in my book.

My weekends are dedicated to cooking and baking. Although I'm known to go overboard with baking, I had to consciously stop myself to only bake one sweet treat a week - unless I'm extremely stressed out. So this weekend, I wanted to make yogurt cake. But yogurt cake again?? It becomes so boring after five times. I need baking to be exciting and interesting. So here's another variation of Dorie Greenspan's French Yogurt Loaf - made even better.

I happened to have lavender sugar in my cupboard. I got this from Gerwerhaus so long ago - one of the many things that I have in my pantry that seemed to be a good idea to get at that time and now, I'm just clueless as to what to do with it. The blood orange element to this is in the form of an orange infused olive oil. My aunt sent me this a few months ago and I often wondered what to do with it. Of course, I could make salad dressings or drizzle it on top of savoury food but when you put this into baked goods, they become extra tasty.

What worked well here is that both flavours are not overpowering. Instead both were very subtle enough to be able to standout. It's a very elegant combination - one that's not used very often.

Adapted from Dorie Greenspan's French Yogurt Loaf Recipe @ Baking From My Home to Yours

Here's the ingredient list:

1 cup plain flour
1/2 cup almond flour
2 tsps baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup lavender sugar
1/2 cup raw sugar - you can use caster sugar too
1/2 cup plain whole milk yogurt
1/2 cup blood orange infused olive oil
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
3 large eggs

Preheat the oven to 160C. Grease a large 9 inch non stick loaf pan. Mix the dry ingredients together and set aside. Mix the sugars and the wet ingredients. Add the dry to wet ingredients and mix until just combined. I baked mine in the oven for 40-50 minutes. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes before turning it out on a rack to cool completely.