Torta all'Arancia (Orange Cake Inspired by Ada Boni and Marcella Hazan)

Author Notes

This recipe is inspired by a cake Marcella Hazan calls torta di arance all'anconetana. It sounds in nearly every single way like Ada Boni's orange cake from The Talisman, calling for identical amounts of eggs, butter, sugar, and flour (though Ada's asked for half all-purpose flour, half potato starch). Ada's cake includes rum, while Marcella's calls for uozo (or sambuca, the more traditional liqueur from this region), but the main difference is that Marcella's cake includes baking powder and the freshly grated zest of three oranges. But what got me was the final touch: 2 cups of freshly squeezed orange juice, slightly sweetened, poured over the entire cake while it's still hot out of the oven. As the cake is left to absorb the juice, it becomes super moist, soft, and fluffy—but not sticky or dense. And delightfully, perfectly citrusy.

Not all oranges are created equal; different varieties have different levels of sweetness and juice, so taste them before using them in this cake:
- I used slightly bitter oranges with a very thin peel, which resulted in a cake on the right side of being not too sweet, with a good level of acidity.
- I also added an extra spoonful of sugar in the juice for this reason. But if you're using very sweet Navel oranges, for example, you may want to try using less sugar or even substituting a lemon for one of the oranges for a balance of acidity.
- You also want to choose oranges that have an edible peel—and a flavorful, fragrant one at that. Many commercial oranges are covered in a mixture of fungicides and wax, which you probably don't want to grate into your cake. Helena Attlee calls these the most processed of unprocessed foods. Go for organic or unwaxed oranges for the best zest.
- Also try a microplane for zesting; you won't get any of the unwanted, bitter with pith in there with one of these.

I added a couple spoonfuls of sugar and served the cake with a dusting of confectioners' sugar and some slices of mandarin (cooked for 10 minutes or until tender in a splash of water). If you don't have rum on hand, you can substitute sambuca or brandy; if you don't want to use any alcohol, leave it out but you may need to add a splash of milk or orange juice to loosen the cake batter a little. —Emiko