Hot milk bundt cake

This hot milk bundt cake is wonderfully soft, moist and stays fresh for several days. Its signature feature is the addition of boiling milk and butter, which gives the sponge its delicate texture and tender crumb. The flavour is easy to customise, too. I chose classic vanilla, but you can just as easily make a lemon, orange or lime version by adding freshly grated citrus zest.

For a lemon cake, replace the vanilla with the finely grated zest of an unwaxed lemon and use lemon juice instead of water for the icing. The same method works beautifully with oranges or limes.

Ingredients for the hot milk bundt cake:

• 4 large eggs
• 250 g caster sugar
• 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract or 8 g vanillin sugar
• 110 g unsalted butter
• 230 ml milk
• 280 g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

All the ingredients should be at room temperature.

Place the butter and milk in a saucepan and heat until the mixture comes to the boil and the butter has completely melted.

Meanwhile, place the eggs and sugar into the bowl of a mixer. Whisk on high speed until the mixture is very pale, thick and tripled in volume. This should take about 7–10 minutes in a stand mixer or 10–15 minutes with a hand mixer. When lifted, the batter should fall slowly in a ribbon and remain visible on the surface for several seconds. Sift the flour and baking powder directly into the whipped egg mixture. Add the vanilla, then immediately pour in the hot milk and butter mixture. Fold everything together gently until just combined. The batter will be quite thin.

Grease and flour a 2.2-litre Bundt tin (approximately 25 cm wide and 10 cm high with a narrow centre tube), shaking out any excess flour. Pour the batter into the prepared tin.

Bake at 175°C for 45–50 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave the cake in the tin for 15 minutes, then carefully turn it out onto a wire rack or serving plate to cool completely. The cake may shrink very slightly as it cools – this is perfectly normal. Once cooled, drizzle with icing.

Ingredients for the icing:

• 120 g icing sugar
• 3–4 tablespoons hot water

Place the icing sugar into a bowl and mix with the hot water using the back of a spoon until smooth. Add a little more water if the icing is too thick, or more icing sugar if it is too thin.

Drizzle over the cooled cake.

Enjoy!

Source: Life Is But a Dish (recipe adapted).