• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to footer navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

RecipeTin Eats

Fast Prep, Big Flavours

Small book

My cookbook "Dinner" now available!

  • My RecipeTin
  • My cookbook!
  • Recipes
  • Recipes By Category
    • Mains
      • Chicken
        • Chicken mince
      • Beef Recipes
        • Ground Beef (Mince)
      • Pork
      • Lamb
      • Turkey
      • Shrimp / Prawns
      • Salmon
      • Fish
      • Salad Meals
    • Quick and Easy
    • Soups
    • One Pot
    • Stews
    • Slow Cooker
    • Sides
      • All
      • Vegetables
      • Show Off Salads
      • Rice (all)
      • Fried rice
      • Rice (plain)
      • Potato
    • Pasta
      • All
      • Pasta bakes
      • Pasta salads
    • Sweet
      • Cakes
      • Cheesecakes
      • Cupcakes & Muffins
      • Cookies
      • Puddings & Cosy Desserts
      • Bite Size
      • Pies
      • Slices & Bars
      • Frosting & Icing
      • Ice cream
    • Cuisine
      • Asian
        • All
        • Stir fries
        • Noodles
        • Soups
        • Chinese
        • Japanese
        • Korean
        • Thai
        • Vietnamese
      • French
      • Greek
      • Indian
      • Italian
      • Mediterranean
      • Mexican
      • Middle Eastern
      • South American
    • Dietary
      • Gluten Free
      • Low Calorie
      • Vegetarian
    • Other Categories
      • BBQ
      • Breakfast
      • Burgers
      • Cocktails
      • Party Foods
      • Rice Recipes
      • Roasts
      • Sandwiches & Sliders
  • Collections
  • About
    • Me
    • RecipeTin Meals
    • Free Recipe Books
    • Contact
    • Food Bloggers Central
    • Nitty Gritty
      • Policy: Use of Recipes & Images
      • Privacy & Disclosure
Home Cakes

Whole Orange Cake – rind and all!

By:Nagi
Published:16 Oct '20Updated:21 Sep '21
782 Comments
Recipe v Video v Dozer v

I love this Orange Cake for the nutty flavour, damp and sticky texture, the beautiful orange flavour, and the unique method by which it’s made: blitzing whole oranges, rind and all, with almond meal, sugar, eggs and baking powder. No oil, no butter, no whisking!

Terrific easy cake for gatherings. And because it’s gluten-free and lactose free, everyone can enjoy it!

Overhead photo of Orange Cake - flourless, gluten free

Whole Orange Cake

If you’ve spent a lifetime peeling oranges, it might sound strange that this cake is made using a whole orange.

But here’s the thing – as with lemons and limes, most of the orange flavour is in the rind. You will get way better orange flavour by mixing 1 tablespoon of finely grated orange zest into, say, Vanilla Frosting, rather than 1/4 cup of orange juice. Not to mention that zest doesn’t make frostings and cake batters watery.

So – we like rind for flavour. But we don’t like the pith – the white part underneath the skin – because it’s bitter.

Solution: boil the oranges. This removes the bitterness as well as softening the oranges to make them “jammy”, which makes the cake damp and sticky inside.

Close up of slice of Orange Cake, ready to be served

What goes in Orange Cake

Just 5 ingredients:

  • Whole fresh oranges

  • Almond meal (aka ground almonds) – see note below

  • Sugar

  • Eggs

  • Baking powder (make sure it’s gluten free if you’re making this as a gluten free cake)

Ingredients in Orange Cake - flourless, gluten free

Just a note on a couple of the ingredients:

Almond meal / ground almonds

This is literally raw almonds that are blitzed into a fine powder. It’s easily found nowadays, sold in the dried fruit & nut section and health food section of grocery stores.

You can also make your own by blitzing 250g/ 9oz raw, unpeeled, unsalted almonds in a powerful blender (I use a Vitamix) until it becomes a fine powder.

Almond flour is different but can also be used. This is made with blanched, peeled almonds, blitzed until it becomes powder form. It is lighter in colour (because the brown skin is removed) and it has a finer texture so it will give it slightly fluffier consistency. It also has a slightly less pronounced almond flavour.  Almond flour is not as common in Australia. I’ve purchased it from those health food places where you serve yourself from tubs, like Scoop Wholefoods. 

Oranges

The fresh oranges cannot be substituted with orange juice – the batter in this recipe relies on the thickness of the pureed oranges. Also, using whole oranges delivers massive orange flavour that OJ can never replicate!!

You will need 2 medium oranges about 8cm / 3″ in diameter (think baseball size) totalling around 600g/1.2 lb. You don’t need to be exact here – if they weigh more, your cake will be a little bit more moist. If they weigh less, that’s totally fine – almond meal cakes are super moist already, you won’t feel deprived.

But obviously if you have tiny ones, use multiple!

Can lemons be used as well?

Unfortunately not! Tried, and it was too bitter because the ratio of pith to flesh is higher. But it had a gorgeous lemon flavour. Still working on it!


How to make Orange Cake

The method used for this orange cake recipe is quite unique with the bonus being that it’s easy and low-effort. As mentioned above, oranges are boiled to soften and remove the bitterness from the pith (white part of rind). After this, they are blitzed – rind and all – with the remaining ingredients to make the batter.

You normally can’t use a food processor or blender for cake recipes made with flour because they’re simply too powerful so they will overwork the gluten in the batter, resulting in horridly hard, rubbery cakes!

First – boil and chop

How to make Orange Cake - flourless, gluten free

  1. Boil oranges in water for 10 minutes;

  2. Drain, then repeat twice more. (ie 3 x 10 minutes) The purpose of this step is to remove the bitterness from the white part of the rind – if you skip this (and there are some recipes that do) then the cake will be bitter. Shortcut: Boil 40 minutes without draining, but keep an eye on water level. The flavour is marginally “cleaner” if you change the water as directed, but this shortcut is perfectly acceptable;

  3. Slice oranges and remove seeds; then

  4. Roughly chop – no need to be meticulous here, it’s just to help it blitz faster.

Then – blitz and bake!

How to make Orange Cake

  1. Place in a food processor. Blender also works, but I find it more tedious to scrape all the batter out. A NutriBullet works brilliantly for the blitzing but is too small for the whole batch of batter . So just do the oranges first, pour into bowl, blitz remaining ingredients, then mix everything together in the bowl;

  2. Blitz for 3 x 10 second bursts on high, scraping down the sides well, until you no longer see the large lumps and it’s looks like jam. It may take longer depending on the strength of your food processor. Basically, the less orange rind bits, the better – but some rind bits are ok, great jammy texture!

  3. Add the remaining ingredients – almond meal, baking powder, sugar and eggs, then blitz until well combined. If at this stage you realise there’s still too many rind chunks, you can blitz for longer;

  4. Pour into a lined cake pan – 1 x 23cm/9″  (cake will be 4 cm / 1.7″ tall) or 2 x 20cm / 8″ (cake will be 3 cm / 2.2″ tall);

  5. Bake for 60 minutes until the cake is golden and a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean; and

  6. Cool in the pan – it’s too fragile to remove while warm. The cake will shrink some, as you can see in the photo above.

Ready to serve Orange Cake - flourless, gluten free

Decoration Suggestions

Unlike some cakes, I think an unadorned Orange Cake is lovely because it has a gorgeous golden orange colour. Also, this cake is so moist and full of flavour, you do not need nor want a frosting. I’ve seen some recipes that soak similar cakes in orange syrup – too sweet for me!

However, if you want to give it some pretty finishing touches to impress your work colleagues or friends, here are a few suggestions:

  • Dusting of icing sugar / powdered sugar – simple and pretty!

  • Fresh oranges (pictured above) – cut thin slices of oranges with rind on, then cut a slit to the middle. Then twist and place on the cake, as shown – it will hold itself in place;

  • Orange rind (pictured above) – use a knife or zester to cut thin strips of orange rind. Orange part only, not the white pith. Twist them around a wooden spoon handle or similar, leave for 10 minutes or so then it will hold it’s shape in loose curls, as pictured. For tight ringlets, leave overnight!

  • Fresh flowers – just a few little sprigs from a tree out of the front of my house are pictured here. Not edible, just for decorations! They’re not orange blossoms either unfortunately….

  • Candied orange peel or dried orange slices – scatter! With or without icing sugar;

  • Toasted almonds – flakes or slivers. To make them stick, you could brush the surface with warmed marmalade loosened with a touch of water;

  • Pomegranate seeds – for a wow-factor pop of red colour!

  • Drippy lemon or orange glaze – use the one in this Lemon Yogurt Cake recipe.

Close up photo showing inside of Orange Cake - flourless, gluten free

How to serve it

I can 100% promise you, this cake is moist and flavourful enough to eat plain. But if you really want something to dollop on the side, yogurt is excellent – the fresh tartness plays extremely well against the nuttiness of the almonds, and I think it’s a better option than cream. Plain or Greek yogurt is best, or a very mildly sweet flavoured one.

For a richer alternative, creme fraiche would be lovely.

It’s also very, very good served ever-so-slightly warmed with a scoop of ice cream on top. Perhaps not conventional – but it works, and that’s what matters! – Nagi x

PS. Also – for gluten-free purposes and just because it’s darn tasty – a suggested alternative to this cake is Flourless Chocolate Cake. New video for this one is coming soon!


Watch how to make it

Hungry for more? Subscribe to my newsletter and follow along on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram for all of the latest updates.

Ready to serve Orange Cake - flourless, gluten free

Whole Orange Cake - flourless

Author: Nagi
Prep: 5 mins
Cook: 1 hr 30 mins
Cooling: 30 mins
Cakes
Western
4.95 from 162 votes
Servings12 - 16 people
Tap or hover to scale
Print
Recipe video above. This is a wonderful moist cake that's bursting with orange flavour in a way that you can only achieve using whole oranges - rind and all! Boiling the oranges removes the bitterness from the pith (white part). You still get the fainest whiff of bitterness in the finshed cake - but it's actually pleasant and reminds you that you're eating real oranges!
It's a terrific and easy cake that's perfect to take to any gatherings since it's also gluten-free and everyone can eat it. The nutty almond flavour is wonderful, and keeps it ultra-moist.
Makes 1 x 23cm 9" cake 4 cm / 1.6" high, or 2 x 20cm/8" cakes 3cm / 1.2" high.

Ingredients

  • 2 medium oranges, fresh whole with rind on - any type (600g/1.4 lb total weight, ~300g / 10 oz each orange, ~ 8cm/3" diametre, Note 1)
  • 1 1/4 tsp baking powder
  • 6 large eggs , at room temp (Note 2)
  • 1 1/4 cups white sugar
  • 2 3/4 cups almond meal / ground almonds (Note 3)

Instructions

Boil oranges:

  • Boil 10 minutes: Place oranges in a pot and cover with cold water. Bring to the boil over medium high heat. Boil for 10 minutes and drain.
  • Repeat x 2: Put oranges back in the pot, cover with cold water and boil again for 10 minutes. Drain, then repeat once more (ie. boil oranges 3 x 10 minutes). Shortcut: Boil 40 minutes without draining, keeping an eye on water level. (Note 4)
  • Chop: Rinse oranges, then cool slightly so you can handle them. Slice into 1cm / 1/4" slices then dice, removing any seeds. Cool completely.

Batter:

  • Preheat oven: Preheat oven to 160°C/320°F (140°C fan). Grease and line a 23cm/9" cake pan with baking/parchment paper. (Note 5)
  • Blitz oranges: Place chopped oranges in a food processor (Note 6). Blitz on high for 4 x 10 second bursts, scraping down the sides in between, until it's pureed into a marmalade consistency with only a few visible bits of rind remaining. It does not need to be completely smooth.
  • Blitz in remaining ingredients: Add almond meal, eggs, baking powder and sugar. Blitz for 5 - 10 seconds on high until combined.
  • Bake 60 minutes: Pour into prepared cake pans. Bake 60 minutes until the surface is golden and a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.
  • Cool: Cool fully in cake pan. Unless using loose base pan, cover surface with baking paper to help you turn it out (cake is sticky so may stick to your hand and tear surface otherwise.)
  • Serve: Decorate as desired - I used slices of fresh oranges, rind strips and sprigs of flowers. A dusting of icing sugar / powdered sugar is also lovely. Cut, then serve! See Note 7 for suggestions.

Recipe Notes:

General
  • Be sure to use gluten-free baking powder if making this for GF purposes!
  • Sweetness - average sweetness, definitely not overly sweet. Sugar can be cut to as little as 1/2 cup but personally, I don't think that's sweet enough.

1. Oranges - the cake is fine with smaller or larger oranges, but aim for around 600g/1.2lb in total. If they are much larger, then the cake will just be more moist. Obviously if yours are tiny, then use more than 2 so they total 600g/1.2lb!
Does it work with lemons? Unfortunately not! Tried, and it was too bitter because the ratio of pith to flesh is higher. But it had a gorgeous lemon flavour. Working on it! Will update when I figure it out.
2. Large eggs - industry standard, labelled as such on egg cartons. 55 - 60g / 2 oz each.
3. Almond meal / ground almonds (same thing) - this is finely blitzed raw, whole almonds in powder form, used in place of flour to add a beautifully nutty flavour to cakes, makes them ultra moist and also gluten-free. Find it in the dried fruit and nut section or health food section of grocery stores. Making your own: 250g/9 oz whole, raw unsalted almonds, blitzed until powdered.
Almond flour is slightly different but can be used. Cake texture will be slightly lighter (almond flour is made with blanched peeled almonds). 
4. Changing water makes the cake flavour a bit cleaner because you're discarding the bitter flavour in the water. But it's only marginal - I've often done a 40 minute straight boil.
5. Cake pans - also great in 2 x 20cm/8" pans, 50 minutes in oven. I like using 1 x 23cm / 9" pan because it's slightly taller.
6. Food processor is best for ease of use. You can also use a blender (it's just more annoying to scrape out all batter) or a NutriBullet (too small for full batter, so blitz oranges first, transfer to bowl, blitz everything else and then mix).
I've also made this by hand when camping: I finely chopped boiled oranges by knife, then used a fork to mash as best I could (mortar and pestle would also work.) To cook, I used a large pot, with a cake pan elevated over simmering water using a few rocks, lid on, about 1 hour. Worked 100% perfectly - and came out even more moist from the steam!
7. Serving: Delicious plain because it's so moist and flavourful, but a dollop of Greek or plain yogurt, or creme fraiche is also wonderful. Otherwise, slightly warmed with vanilla ice cream!
Decorations - see in post for suggestions.
8. Source - This recipe was given to me by a Sydney based professional pastry chef, a recipe she's used at establishments she's previously worked at.
9. Storage - keeps 5 days in an airtight container in the pantry, though if it's hot where you are, then it's recommended to keep in the fridge. Stays 100% perfectly moist! It can also be frozen up to 3 months.
Make ahead: Oranges can be boiled and chopped the day before, and refrigerated. Bring to room temp then use per recipe.
10. Nutrition per serving assuming 12 servings.

Nutrition Information:

Calories: 268cal (13%)Carbohydrates: 32g (11%)Protein: 8g (16%)Fat: 14g (22%)Saturated Fat: 2g (13%)Cholesterol: 82mg (27%)Sodium: 32mg (1%)Potassium: 173mg (5%)Fiber: 4g (17%)Sugar: 26g (29%)Vitamin A: 231IU (5%)Vitamin C: 27mg (33%)Calcium: 104mg (10%)Iron: 1mg (6%)
Keywords: flourless cake, orange cake
Did you make this recipe?I love hearing how you went with my recipes! Tag me on Instagram at @RecipeTinEats.

More delicious cakes with fruit

Lemon Cake with drippy lemon glaze decorated with lemon slices and flowers, on a white cake platter with a piece cut out
Lemon Cake with Lemon Glaze
Close up of slices of Blueberry Lemon Loaf , easy blueberry recipe
Blueberry Bread Loaf
The BEST Apple Cake on the internet - very moist, perfectly spiced and so fast & easy to make. No mixer required, just a wooden spoon! Made with fresh apples. recipetineats.com
Easiest Ever MOIST Apple Cake
Overhead photo of Strawberry Cake dusted with icing sugar, ready to be served
Strawberry Cake – really easy cake recipe
A lovely Blueberry Lemon Yoghurt Cake that's incredibly moist and astonishingly quick to make. recipetineats.com
Blueberry Lemon Yoghurt Cake
Close up of a slice of Black Forest Cake ready to be served
Black Forest Cake
This No Bake Mango Cheesecake is a complete and utter celebration of summer! recipetineats.com
No Bake Mango Cheesecake
Pulling out a slice of Lemon Cake with Fluffy Lemon Frosting
Lemon Cake with Fluffy, Less-Sweet Lemon Frosting
Lemon Cake with drippy lemon glaze decorated with lemon slices and flowers, on a white cake platter with a piece cut out
Cakes

Life of Dozer

My money pit.

(I’m talking about the pool. What did you think I was referring to?? 😂)

Dozer and empty pool

Previous Post
Potato Rosti
Next Post
General Tso’s Chicken

Hi, I'm Nagi!

I believe you can make great food with everyday ingredients even if you’re short on time and cost conscious. You just need to cook clever and get creative!

Read More

Free Recipe eBooks

Join my free email list to receive THREE free cookbooks!

Related Posts

Slice of Chocolate custard cake on a plate

Chocolate custard cake

Slices of Cinnamon Apple Bread

Cinnamon Apple Bread

Lemon cheesecake from RecipeTin Eats "Dinner" cookbook by Nagi Maehashi

Lemon Cheesecake

More Cakes

Reader Interactions

Leave a Comment Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Cooked this? Rate this recipe!




782 Comments

  1. Mary Rogan says

    February 2, 2023 at 10:28 am

    Hi Nagi
    Does the almond meal & sugar need sifting for the flourless orange cake? And, would caster sugar be better (lighter) ro use for this cake?

    Reply
  2. Lynda Wilson says

    January 29, 2023 at 1:19 pm

    5 stars
    This cake is the best! Fantastic flavours (not too sweet, definitely not bitter), moist and not too dense. Just right. I separated the batter into 2 x 20 cm cake tins, as per Nagi’s notes and served with cream cheese frosting (1/3rd quantity from the Pumpkin cake recipe but added lemon zest and juice). Super successful for my husband’s birthday celebration. Thanks again Nagi!!

    Reply
  3. Janice says

    January 22, 2023 at 9:08 am

    5 stars
    Delicious. Wonderful orange flavor. Wondering if it could be done with lemon or lime?

    Reply
  4. Kim Davis says

    December 17, 2022 at 3:01 pm

    Finally an ORANGE cake! I love it. It was awesome. My husband said it would be good soaked in Rum, but it is already so very moist I worry we would then just have thickened the rum.

    Thank you.

    Reply
Older Comments

Primary Sidebar

Hi, I'm Nagi!

I believe you can make great food with everyday ingredients even if you’re short on time and cost conscious. You just need to cook clever and get creative! Read More

Free Recipe eBooks

Join my free email list to receive THREE free cookbooks!

Meet Dozer

Official taste tester of RecipeTin Eats! Meet Dozer
As Featured On

What's for Dinner?

Close up of beef enchiladas in a baking dish, fresh out of the oven

Beef Enchiladas

Butter Chicken served over basmati rice in a bowl, ready to be served

Butter Chicken

Overhead photo of 2 black bowls with Chinese Chicken Salad with Asian Dressing, ready to be eaten

Chinese Chicken Salad

Salisbury Steak recipe in skillet.

Salisbury Steak with Mushroom Gravy

Vietnamese Coconut Caramel Chicken - 7 ingredient magic. The coconut fragrance is heavenly! recipetineats.com

Vietnamese Coconut Caramel Chicken

Fast prep. Big flavours!

Never miss a recipe

Back to Top
  • Related
  • RecipeTin Japan
  • Food Bloggers Center
  • Help
  • Contact Us
  • Image Use
  • Privacy Policy & Terms
Site Credits Maintained by Zao Designed by Melissa Rose Design Developed by Once Coupled © RecipeTin Eats 2023 · All Rights Reserved Back to Top